I finally sank into the chair by the Christmas tree to catch my breath.
Struck again with the anxieties of this season:
This season of the year and all its expectations.
This season of life and all its weariness.
From the daily-of-life to the enormous-of-life.
Wondering the whys of circumstances and challenges.
Why are there those parts in our stories that we just do not like?
Why did this past July have to hold such enormous news and emotion:
- of our pregnancy
- my sister's cancer
- my father-in-law's cancer
And the longer-ago lingering events:
Why did we have to go through such a loss in our first year of marriage?
Why did my husband have to lose his mom when they were both so young?
Why did our friends have to lose their babies?
Why did our loved one have to go through the loss of a marriage? Why did each of our boys have the diagnoses that needed surgeries at their little ages?
Why sudden pains and losses and life changes we just don't want to swallow.
...Oh-so many more stories we just didn't want to include in our stories.
These longer-past events, they may have some sort of answers and meaning.
But the raw, fresh circumstances? So hard to see as clearly.
Can we trust there is a purpose for those things?
As I took a moment of somewhat-quiet while the boys watched an old children's Christmas movie I grew up watching, it suddenly hit me:
- When Mary and Joseph arrived at the inn "late" and all available rooms were taken, it SO would not have seemed ideal. Not one bit. Yet that was part of The Big Plan, for them to not have all the comforts and expectations of theirs met how they probably wanted. Not how they dreamed. NOT IDEAL.
And before that, when they had to face the reactions of their peers and community with their unplanned-by-them pregnancy... that had to have been a horrendous experience to live through. Not easy. NOT IDEAL.
- And when they had to take that long and uncomfortable journey (pregnant and dusty and riding a donkey? As someone on my fourth pregnancy, I just cannot imagine. Not comfortable!) NOT IDEAL.
- And so when they finally arrived at their destination (later than all the others in the crowds), discovering there was no private space to rest in? Not lovely or pretty. NOT IDEAL.
But, was there meaning and reason behind each of these ordeals?
These parts of the story they probably didn't like?
Or times we felt "late" and that the timing was off (late to arrive, not how we envisioned a life event, our hope to be comfortable and at ease)?
Absolutely.
And it's what we treasure about the story of Christmas:
The sacrifices, the trust, the love, the faith. In something bigger than themselves or what they could see.
It just didn't seem clear or lovely way right away.
Why such losses and why such tragedies.
The beauty from the ashes.
The deeper love for another.
The deeper appreciation for the good.
The deeper maturity in your soul.
The deeper faith grown.
The deeper understanding that we are not the biggest thing in the world.
(There is something more.)
This quote stands out in my mind as these thoughts flutter around:
"The demanding of my own will is the singular force that snuffs out joy."
(Ann Voskamp,
http://www.aholyexperience.com/2014/12/light-the-candles-advent-devotionals-week-03-joy-video-experience/)
When my expectations and will for the rest of this week (and this life's season) may not turn out how I had hoped...
And when I wonder and question why certain circumstances are the way they are:
This is okay, even the best way.
Letting go.
And resting in the larger meaning, beyond what I can see right now.
Trusting that one day, someday, it will be clear.
"Rest happy and love this story of a coming King
who prepares the downtrodden for Christmas by becoming the Way,
who lays Himself down in the creche, on the Cross,
so we can lie down and rest."
(Ann Voskamp, "The Greatest Gift")
So I am slowing down and trying to remember to shut out all the clutter and worries,
huge and tiny.
May you slow down also, and look back on the meaning in how your story has gone...
(At least for the moment.
Then we'll need to be reminded again.)
Blessings on your own season,
Elizabeth
