Due to the fire cleanup (Check out Joy That Doesn't Burn Away if you missed the Moment where I shared about our recent blaze) our decorations that survived have been cleaned, boxed up and put away. It seemed so sad to be removing those joyful lights and box the trees, nutcrackers and snowmen before the end of the year. The house seemed so bare and the dinginess of the smoke damage even more depressing. It somewhat felt like the light of God had fled our home.
Thankfully it hasn't, and I know that. Feelings are not facts, and wondering where God is right here at this moment in all of this does not mean that He is not present. Just because we can not feel His comfort for a moment doesn't mean the Comforter isn't holding us close. That Christmas is done doesn't mean that what we were celebrating is done for now also. Many have Christmas in the rear view mirror and are looking ahead to New Year's or their birthday, or even looking farther ahead over the next 361 days until next Christmas. We tend to do that, spend our days looking ahead for the next big or new thing, the next event worth celebrating, the next new move of God, while we sort of ignore or box up today. But Daddy's love for us is as real and as full toward us on the ordinary, dingy days as it is when everything is bright and shiny.
Months before the first Christmas, the angel appeared to Mary and told her of Daddy's plan. Her response was let it be done to me according to Your will. God called, and she said yes to His will for her life, and through her life, for all the world. A few months later while pregnant with Jesus, she is blessed by her cousin, Elizabeth. And this time her response is praise. We call her words the song of Mary, and they can be found in Luke 1:46-55. Luke 1, especially this portion, is a common Christmas scripture, and we tend to look at it as a part of a joyful celebration of that first Christmas.
But this wasn't a happy, glorious time for Mary, or at least not a totally happy one. I doubt her friends and family were throwing any baby showers for her. The truth of her words that this was a special baby growing within who was conceived by the Holy Spirit had not been proven by the man the baby would grow to be. That proof is what we celebrate on Easter, months away for us, decades away for her. She faced the looks, the rumors and whispers, the shame others cast her way. Even her fiance hadn't yet had his own angelic visitation yet and doubted her. All he knew was that the baby wasn't his. She faced losing all. But she knew God loved her, had chosen her as part of His purpose and plan, and that He was her salvation. So she praised the Daddy who loved her, in the dingy, dark of misunderstanding and uncertainty.
Christmas may be over for us for now, but if the end of the year feels a little dark and dingy, if the glory of God is not as bright and evident in our now, it's OK. We don't have to set aside today and look to the future. We, like Mary, can rejoice in God our Savior right now. Because it's when things are hard and it's difficult or impossible to ignore or pretend away the effects of the curse on our life that Daddy's love for us is even more precious. That's when we most need the refuge of His love. Whether it is felt or not, we can trust that He loves us as we are, not as we should be, and that His love is enough to carry us through the difficulties of despair and everyday life when the party is over and the decorations are put away. We can stay and rejoice in this moment without looking for distraction, without looking ahead to something else, without grabbing for help and solace in anything this world has to offer, without turning to false solutions and manufactured light, because the true light of His love for us shines on us still and is enough, even when we can not see it through the ash stained remains of our expectations.
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