Sometimes, the Advent & Christmas season arrives with joy and singing. We feel prepared and are excited about the prospect of seeing family and spending time with friends. Our homes look festive and welcoming, and our hearts are open and ready to receive all the blessing this season has to offer us. Other times, though, we arrive at this season with little enthusiasm. We are frustrated by the holiday disruptions to the regular patterns of our lives, knowing by the end of it all we will be even more behind on things than we were before. All we can see before us is endless to-do lists and the overwhelming crush of expectations we can never live up to.
The flawless image of the nativity scene at the center of our imaginations is often where we go wrong in our expectant thinking. That perfect image of a calm and bright Christmas. It sounds great on the page and in our imaginations, but let’s be honest, Christ’s arrival was pure chaos. A dung-smelling, filthy birthing room after an exhausting journey to a place Joseph and Mary were forced by governmental decree to go to, followed by playing host to strangers arriving with tales of terrifying angels and thrusting expectations on a child only hours old. There was no order, limited preparedness, and everybody was just doing the best they could with what was in front of them.
And yet, the in-breaking of God’s love arrived anyway, just as it does today. A love that doesn’t wait for the perfect time and setting. A love that seeks us out no matter where we are, how prepared we are, and what kind of headspace we are in. Merry Christmas!