A Start

“Lord, I don’t want to miss it! I desperately don’t want to miss You! Not again this year!”

I was explaining to my sister and niece the other day that it seems that every Christmas storms into my life with it’s busyness and cookies and presents and planning and when it’s done I feel like I missed it all. Everything. At least everything meaningful.

I often peer back at the rush of it and my heart aches with disappointment. I missed Him. Again. And I tread into the New Year with a bit of grief.

I remember one year sitting in the church pew as a teen feeling the same. I looked around at the others at the candlelit Christmas Eve service and all I could think was what was I possibly missing? Why does everyone see Jesus and the wonder and seem to “adore” Him and I am just grappling at having any connection with Him at all?

This morning my son is helping my girls set up their new princess legos they got from their auntie for Christmas. There’s an unadulterated joy in their voices and ramblings and I am still looking out the window and wondering.

Who AM I looking for? Is it really the Christ-child or is it someone else? Is it a feeling? If it is merely an emotion, I still don’t have a name for it. Whomever and whatever I am seeking, I am just weary of the seeking that never seems to be satisfied.

And if I stop in the tears and unsettling of the unknown, I wonder if that’s the point. The waiting. The desperate waiting for relief.

All over Scripture we see nature and people were WAITING for the Savior to come. Desperately looking in hope and expectation, knowing that God would fulfill His promise.

And when Jesus was born, all of creation exhaled. Whether they knew immediately He was physically present in their world or not, I imagine there being a flood of unexplained peace that just trickled into every crevice of the earth.

Hope was born.

And maybe that’s how it starts, at least for me. I must have a desperate craving for Him to really experience the communion I hope for. I must search for Him. Express it to Him. I have tasted His presence and anything less just seems so counterfeit.

Afterall, how precious is something that is easy to come by? That just falls in your lap? Or warms your heart at the first nonchalant mention?

So the first step is exactly where I’m at.

Jesus, I just want you. Everything else just leaves me empty. Let your birth bring a new perspective. And may the beauty and amazingness and craziness and miracle of You coming to earth start to penetrate within.

I just crave hope. I crave You.

And if you’re in the same spot as me, take heart. You’re not alone. Even in the midst of the world’s fake Santa Holiday delight, real. joy. lives.

His name is Jesus Christ.

He stands as ready as He ever has; even as ready as He was at birth and as He died on the cross…for you…for me.

He won’t come uninvited. He just wants an honest heart that craves Him.

And I’ll start there. In my waiting and my discomfort. In my hope and anticipation.

And if you’re with me there, maybe you can start there too. Sit in that melancholy, searching, wondering, the uneasiness, or maybe grief and feel it. Take your hands and give it to the Christ-child. Let it go and just let Him move.

He has come. He is here. He is coming again.