Advent Longing

This holiday season feels to me like a jumble...much like how my year has gone...and I'm longing for change. For hope. 

I've thrown Christmas decor up in November because I was leaving for Thanksgiving and it was late in the month this year and I'm staying after to make memories because I'm trying not to let a chance to give love go to waste. And I've arrived back home to all the things I've yet to do in time for Christmas coming. And all I want is for Christmas-peace to invade this chaos and show me Christ in all His fullness. 

My heart is in its own Advent-longing, praying for renewal after a year I'd honestly like to un-do. I began this twelve-month cycle with all the expectation in the world, ready to "step into an unknown with a known God," as I termed it, "trusting Him to fulfill His plans." I could never have expected that so much pain lay ahead. I thought last year was hard! 2019 was even harder. The previous year had ended with an earthquake, the affects of which are still being felt now. But the soul-shaking that was to come would prove an even greater test than living through the earth-splitting remnants of a natural disaster. 

It's fitting that Christmas comes at the end of the calendar. It's like we need its holy reminder after all we've been through that a Sovereign God is still on His throne, breaking royal boundaries to pursue the ones He loves. Entering the messy of our world to reach the hearts of the broken. Doing the unthinkable in order to save the lost and dying. It's like we need to see the visual of God in human flesh to show us that there is no length He won't go to in order to give us hope. To give us abundant life. 

Hope of all the earth, Thou art...hope of every longing heart. 

It's as if Christmas positions us at the end of the year to look with expectation toward the new year ahead and with peace at the year that's been, seeing God's faithfulness woven through every part. Christmas proves that humanity forever is in need of a God-miracle to rescue us from our own selves and that God so loved that He gave. That He was willing to be the broken gift. And that He calls us as His children to do the same. 

Go, give your life away and you will discover what the God-Man came to do. 

Cold soul-winds have blown my heart to pieces this year. The darkness has, at times, seemed impenetrable. But through it all, Hope has shown up. Time and time again. Hope showed up in a stable when the world little seemed to notice Him and He continues to arrive hidden even now. But those who choose to see, find Him. Those who choose to be found by Him, find the life they've always wanted. Find the meaning to all their suffering in the One who suffered most for them. 

Come, Thou long-expected Jesus, born to set Thy people free. 

In the bleakness of our deepest winter, Jesus is still there. And I think of all the people I know who have had to believe this in the most painful ways this year. Of how I've had to believe it, too. How many times we've believed not because because we felt it was true but because He said it was. How our feelings often betrayed us and thank God, we didn't listen to them. Faith is always knowledge in the concrete evidence of things unseen. God isn't always readily visible. And when we can't trace His hand is when we choose to trace His heart and count on His impeccable track record that has yet to fail...and never will. 

From our fears and sins release us; let us find our rest in Thee. 

In the silence of a stable, God showed that we were not too far gone for Him to redeem us. That nothing is so desperate that He cannot bring good. 

Come, Thou Dayspring, come, and cheer

Our spirits by Thine advent here;

Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,

And death's dark shadows put to flight.

Lights flicker on the Christmas tree, and I'm lost in wonder. Amid the darkness of this world, Christ shines the brighter and this, His birthday, reminds us all.