This year Christmas seems so different from the rest. It seems like this year has sped by and showed up all of a sudden with little notice. It hasn't really "felt" like Christmas to me. Maybe because for me personally, this Christmas in Germany is completely different from all the other ones I've had in America. Not better or worse at all, just new and different. Possibly it seems distant because it has very much sneaked up on me. Or still, maybe because, this year, the brightness of the hope of your birth seems a little harder to find in the midst of a month that has had many sad moments and elements. But I know it's not about "feelings" and I don't have to have the warm fuzzies for weeks straight to be thankful. Because I am. Deeply thankful. After about 20 years of walking with you, it is still unfathomable to me how sinful yet perfectly loved I am to have a Beautiful Savior to come be my Emmanuel in the manger, and my Perfect Substitute on the cross. Not just for me, but for the World!
So in this moment, I want to spend some time (however inadequate my words are) to just say Thank You. Thank You that You are my Hope, that You are my Home. Thank You for being my reason to constantly rejoice! You, Emmanuel, have come to redeem and ransom captive hearts and lives and bring freedom that reaches the most extreme depth. I think I'm the most thankful that Christmas means hope and freedom. Christmas means hope and freedom.Wow. God, allow that truth to sink deeper and deeper into our hearts and marinade in our core. Because I need that hope and freedom. This world needs that hope and freedom. Hope that the best is yet to come, and freedom from all that would hinder us from fully reveling in and becoming undone by that truth. Because when we truly believe those things and encounter You in such a way, we will never be the same.
So God, right now, I ask You to give Your Light anew. Would you please remove the sleep from our eyes so that we may see Your Hope and Freedom as they truly are? The problem is not with You, that the Light of Your Hope and Freedom have become dimmer. No, You remain unchanged, shinning just as brilliantly in the darkness today as you did over 2,000 years ago. We just have personal problems. The problem is that our spiritual vision has become dulled and is no longer sharp. So God, in Your great mercy, I ask you to allow myself, and any who find themselves aching for Your Hope and Freedom, to taste, see and experience it more deeply. I ask You to continue to heal and restore our hearts vision this new year, that we will not be left unchanged.
I also thank You that You came to this world to be perfected by Your suffering. God, that truth only adds to Hope and Freedom You offer. What a comfort to know that You understand. You are Emmanuel. Here with us. Not some distant, uncaring God. You are a God of action driven by passion, and You chose mankind to be Your passion. Even when that passion would hurt, require an absurd amount of sacrifices and get dirty. Thank you for not shying away from our brokenness but embracing and healing it...healing and embracing us. The agape you continually show knows no bounds, cannot be thwarted, stops at nothing and that humbles me. Neither of us deserves the other, just to the opposite extremes. We deserve exponentially worse, and You exponentially better. But You laid down Your life and rights, so that we might have the privilege to taste Life. That only makes You a better, more admirable lover, and the contrast of two opposites attracting a more compelling love story. Thank You for risking and forsaking everything for love. I really have no words.
I love You and thank You seem so small and stale. I feel like I need to make up my own word in an attempt to encapsulate at least some of what is really going on inside of my heart. But right now just listen to my heart. Because it loves You back.
Happy Birthday Jesus, You're my absolute favorite.
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