A nervous child approaches a
homeless family in the hope that they will be pleased with the only thing he
has to offer: some simple music played
on his little drum.
It is a strange idea that this
event would be cause for celebration—we might even consider the scene to be
nothing short of pathetic. In its very simplicity and humility, "Little
Drummer Boy"—perhaps the most underrated of all Christmas songs—captures
the essence of what is so very revolutionary and compelling about the Christian
message.
We know well the setting of the
manger on Christmas night—most of us can instantly and fondly picture the
comforting scene of the loving family amongst the gentle animals and amazed
shepherds. In fact, the scene was much harsher than that: the family lived in poverty, they were
outcasts in their own society, they feared their government and they had no
shelter in which to give birth to their baby. So, in the cold of winter, found
themselves in a stable.
The plain-spoken Drummer Boy
calls our attention to the poverty of this situation as he addresses the infant
Christ, simultaneously asking permission to play his drum and apologizing for
the inadequacy of his gift. He not only
exhibits remarkable humility, but an inherent understanding of the very thing
that makes this infant "King" so very different than any that had
ever been imagined, and very much like all of us: "I am a poor boy
too."
Even as the song brings to mind
the simplicity of the scene on Christmas night, it also foreshadows much of
what will happen in the brief life of the infant Jesus. That baby, whom the
Drummer Boy identified with that night as another poor boy like him, would go
on to address the masses in the most important speech ever given, saying among
other things: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom
of Heaven". The mother who gave the Drummer Boy permission to play his
song, the mother in whose arms the infant rested, would some thirty-three years
later hold her child again, cradling the dead body of a man who had been
tortured and executed in the manner of a common criminal, challenges us to imagine
her clean and untouched infant again, rather than the destroyed body of the grown
man.
Every bit of the Christian story,
in the context of its time, was profoundly subversive. Poor boys were not to be
kings. Salvation was not to be found in death. Humility was not to be
celebrated. A world-devouring empire executed a minor nuisance that was meant
to be the end of the matter. Christ changed everything, broke every rule,
shattered every pretension.
In his own way the Drummer Boy
does something similar: he shows a different
and more moving way to give of ourselves, to do what we can, without pride or
worldly ambition: "I played my drum
for him, I played my best for him." His simple reward is fitting of the
humble scene: "Then He smiled at me."
So, on hearing "Little Drummer
Boy" each Christmas, we should be reminded that the very birth we are
celebrating is a call to poverty of the spirit. To be poor in spirit, as Christ
asked of us on the Mount of Beatitudes, is to admit our weaknesses, our
insecurities, our shortcomings. In recognizing these in ourselves, we are able
to feel compassion when we find them in others, and we are moved to act on
their behalf.
This is the best of Christmas and
the Christian message: to say, in the manner of a scared young boy before the
most unlikely of Kings, in the cold of an often harsh world, "I am a poor
boy too."
