The Christmas Advent season is about celebrating Christ's birth, but also His return. These are my thoughts this Christmas Eve, before the First day of Christmas on December 25, and it's march towards the 12 days of Christmas that follow:
Comment from 10 years ago when I was 43 years young:
I don't find myself fearing Christ's return as some are tempted to do. No, as I look at the Nativity Ornament so plain and simple on my tree, just an Arch, with child like toy symbols of Mary and Joseph standing on each side of the manger - my heart breaks - my Heavenly Father came to Earth not just as a helpless child, but to the poorest of the poor - never living a life of wealth upon the earth himself - coming to grow up to be spit upon, to be beaten, to be flogged, to be crucified - and yet Adam's seed was that blind - it breaks my composure as a man, I am humbled and near tears like a teenager, not a 40 something man in midlife . . .
My hearts breaks at the tragedy of what should have been - he should have been welcomed, he should have been given a seat of honor - his entire time on the Earth with us should have been one of us worshiping Him the whole time - but it was not . . .
I stop and ponder - just 20 years ago it seemed as though there was plenty of time - as though life had an abundance of it - and I was not one to waste any of it purposely, no in many ways I gave of it not knowing the cost of it - but even so would I have done things differently? Where I did good, no . . . where I erred and stumbled - no, I had to err and stumble or there would have been no revelation of more sure footing, no revelation of a better way to walk - no, some wisdom can only come with time - as much as I would like to go back and do things differently, would I have simply stumbled in a different fashion? Would avoiding the painful lessons of life yield harder lessons and even harder pain?
No, life is not about works righteousness any way, it is about faith, especially faith in the Holy Spirit . . . comforter, counselor - neither adequate translations of PARCLATOS from the NT Greek - the word literally translates "the one who comes along side to help you walk" and the imagery is of a parents holding a toddler's hand, and helping them to walk . . . has there ever been a day in my life that I did not need the Holy Spirit to hold my hand and guide me to walk? No, there has never been day . . . there has never been a day that I have not needed to be born anew/again . . . no instead there have been spiritual toddler tantrums on my part . . . no let me walk, let me do it my way . . . and my way was painful, but there was that patient spiritual parent to take my foolish little temporal hands and offer to hold them again . . . to help pull from the mud and mire I had fallen into . . . to come along and clean anew - to sanctify yet once again - to make clean what I in my stubborness soiled so foolishly . . .
Every child has to learn to operate within their family . . . they have to learn the boundaries . . . they have to learn respect . . . they have to learn what great sacrifices they never knew were made for them so often in quiet humbleness . . . so quiet you would almost think the parent was keeping a secret . . . but no this was just the nature of the parent to love you so . . . for they look into your eyes and see their own soul reflected . . . it is not so easy to turn away such flesh and blood . . . no it should be impossible to do so.
Even when the child is walking without the hands so much holding them . . . they now learn anew to hold other hands . . . first a love . . . then an offspring . . . then to return to hold the hands that once held you now that they are old and weak . . .
The lessons of the Holy Spirit are around us, they surround us, their quiet witness once listened to is so loud, its like encountering quiet for the first time in weeks, months, or years, and now the quiet causes a ringing in your ears that is so loud you cannot quiet the quiet . . .
No, I am not terrified or afraid of my Saviors return . . . no instead I find myself worried . . . does my daily walk reflect back love, gratefulness, humility . . . is my love for my Savior real . . . or am I treating my God as something less than One who deserves worship . . .
As a teenager, when I felt the Spirit move upon me, I felt this was true worship . . . this doesn't get any better than this . . . and now in my midlife I am so humbled by the nail prints in the feet that walk before me . . . so humbled by the nail print and scarred hands that hold my weak temporal hands giving them balance, showing them how to be be born anew/again . . . how to let go of time . . . how to prepare to embrace Eternity where my real treasure lies . . .
The time is growing shorter and as it grows shorter am I found faithful? This is not about law keeping, this is not about works righteousness, this is not about anything I've ever done . . . it is about . . . "Have I been faithful? Have I really loved? Is my heart like my Father's? When his spiritual eyes look into mine, does he find any of himself there?"
This is what the Advent season has come to mean to me . . .
