The Waiting Room

As a child, Christmas held an air of magic. The smells, trees, lights, decorations, and presents. I remember snuggling with my sister on chilly Christmas Eves, staying up half the night whispering in anticipation and expectation. But the older I get the magic seems to slowly fade, like a ballon losing air.

As each Christmas season nears, I find myself sighing. My exhaustion growing with my increasing obligations, list of to-dos, and the tug of war for my time, energy, and attention. I always tell myself I’m going to do it differently, start in January, do less, enjoy the small moments.

Even as a child, I felt as if something was amiss. As I sat on the floor each Christmas morning, surrounded by an amass of toys, books, clothes, and ripped wrapping paper, I felt a lingering emptiness. I had received everything I wanted, but …?

I’ve come to realize it’s that “hole” we all have. The one that nothing can satiate or fill. It’s like that toy we give our infants. The ball with all the shapes; circle, square, star, triangle… babies will try putting the square in the rectangle repeatedly, and we wonder how long it’s going to take them to understand it will never fit.

And I realize we’re the same way. We spend our lives trying to fill our holes with food, alcohol, people, relationships, busyness, distraction, name your vice … we push and push, but they just won’t fit. And in the end, all we have is a mess of broken pieces.

We have a little sheep with our Nativity set. He’s come along with us in our travels. Along the journey, and three children, he’s broken three legs. But I just can’t get rid of him. Because every time I look at him, I see myself. A lost and broken sheep.

I’ve propped him by the manager, his gaze set on baby Jesus. But even here I wonder if we’re missing it. Our Christmas pageants and manager scenes centered around Jesus’ birth. But do we realize he left Heaven, came off his thrown where he was seated at the right hand of the father, to become a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, laid in a feed trough, in a barn.

But it’s more than that. In that John 1 moment when word became flesh, defying space, time, and eternity, I believe he saw it all. His life on earth, the cross, us, you and me. He heard our names. He knew what lay ahead, and he knew who he was doing it for.

He came to fill our holes, fix our broken pieces, and bring us home. He’s the only one who fits, and he wants to make us whole. Luke 4:18

I imagine a huge Christmas tree, lit and glowing with warmth, inviting. Underneath there are piles of wrapped gifts. One labeled with each of our names. Some have already been opened and received, others still sit, waiting, and still others have been opened, but discarded and thrown aside, unwanted or ignored. What will you do with yours?

In Randy Alcorn’s book Heaven, I came across this quote, “Christmas is coming. We live our lives between the first Christmas and the second.”

As I’ve read that quote over and over the last few weeks I keep thinking about Simeon (Luke 2:25-35). It says he was righteous, devout, and waiting. It had been years, 100s, since the last prophesies. Things had gone silent, but the Holy Spirt had revealed he would see the Lord’s Christ, the Messiah, Jesus, so he waited. He watched.

It’s been almost 2,000 years since his first coming, but we have prophecies too (Matthew 24, Luke 21). Will he find us like Simeon. Righteous, devout, watching, and waiting, with expectancy like a child on Christmas Eve.

I encourage each of you to take the time to read and share these powerful blogs What Kind of A King Would Do Such A Thing? & Through The Innkeeper's Eyes by best-selling author Charles Martin this Christmas season. I came across a similar version in his book What If It’s True? A Storyteller’s Journey with Jesus. It’s completely changed my perspective of Christmas. I try to revisit each year to silence the noise, busyness, and distraction Christmas has become in our culture, and never forget what Christmas is really about.

Wrap This One Up - Christy Nockels

Manger Throne - Phil Wickham

When Love Found Me (Romans 5:8) | Peaceful English–Hebrew Messianic Worship

John 1:1-5 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.  In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome ^a it.”

John 10:11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Titus 2:13 while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed.