My daughter wanted to jump start the Christmas spirit for me and sent this ad. It is the story of the truce on Christmas night on the snowy battlefields of World War I, and it makes me weep. The song by John McCutcheon telling the same miracle has been playing in our house for the last twenty Decembers. Even if I know the ending, which obviously I do after that much repetition, it still reaches into my heart and grabs like a bulldog.

It is a true tale. The bravery of a young man, probably no older than the one asleep upstairs, when he climbed out of a foxhole with his hands up and walked across the barbed wire moves me a hundred years later. It probably seemed unlikely that his brazen steps would become more significant than any tactical move by a string of bayonets. He didn't think that far ahead. He just wanted to see another human being face to face. The looming possibility that he would be shot by a string of rifles did not hold him back. He was bone weary of fighting.

Words were not the magic bullet in what transpired that day. Two armies did not speak the same language. But they sang of the same hope. They shared photographs, and chocolate, and the rivalry of a soccer game. Then with reluctance they climbed back down into their ditches. But the peace that they exchanged in those precious hours made more of a difference than their ammunition ever could. 

A group of friends are trying to bring hope to a marriage in trouble. The battle ground that is their home has not shed blood, but the air is bitter cold. Criticism and blame show up like arrows and the children are scared. 

"Please don't hate Daddy."

The men in army boots did not discuss their ideologies. They shook hands, smiled, played a game, sang songs, offered sweets.

Maybe the couple I am praying for does not need to dissect their problems, or rehash their mistakes. I suspect they are bone weary of fighting. Perhaps if they hold hands and share chocolate, croon a lullaby and kick a ball around their reconciliation will be on the lips of their grandchildren in a hundred years.