it is this time of year that my heart is drawn once again to meditate on the advent.
did you know that advent simply means "coming?" it is a time of expectant waiting and preparation.
oh how i feel it! my heart is being drawn to think on His coming - God made flesh who dwelt among us - and to prepare and wait in eager anticipation His coming again.
this time of year i am back in the gospels. i want to fill my thoughts with the very realness of Jesus walking on this dust, being made of the dust just like us. i want my heart to really believe that He came.
He came.
Immanuel - God with us - He came.
do you know what that means that God dressed Himself in this broken humanity that we live in every. single. day. to show us what He is like? does this bring tears to your eyes like it does to mine? the Almighty God who is the very Creator of everything that exists - the very One who will judge all that has breath, and has every right to do so - humbled Himself to the very lowest place and dwelt among us (phil 2).
He came. He really did what seems so impossible to my logical thinking mind.
oh how that makes my heart ache.
you see, i live in such very real brokenness. just like you. so often my heart wants to rise up in accusation against my very God that He is somehow indifferent to my pain. my heartache. my disappointments.
so often i resist shaking my fist in the air asking, "do you even see me here? do you even care?"
and the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, the glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. john 1:14
and He does see. He cares. He came. Immanuel. He drew near.
yay Lord! we greet Thee,
born this happy morning,
o Jesus! to Thee be all glory given.
Word of the Father, now in flesh appearing;
o come, let us adore Him,
o come, let us adore Him,
o come, let us adore Him,
Christ the Lord.
and He knows. He really knows our sorrow and our brokenness and our grief. and He holds all our tears in a bottle (ps 56:8). He must have a big bottle for mine.
He catches each.
one.
as.
it.
falls.
down. like. rain.
when our pain becomes too much to bear, He does not look away
...even when in our own weakness, we look away.
He was despised and forsaken of men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and like one from whom men hide their face He was despised,
and we did not esteem Him. isaiah 53:3
and i cannot tell you, in the very middle of this broken life i live, how this time of advent becomes so real and alive to me. this is the thrill of hope - that He will not leave us as orphans (john 14:18).
and i long, more than ever before, for His second advent - with expectant waiting i prepare for His coming.
my Immanuel.
He will make the wrong things right. and there are so. many. wrong. things.
too many wrong things.
o come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheerwe can dare to put our hope in Him. this time of year isn't about gifts. it isn't about traditions. it isn't even about family. it is about Him - it is about His coming that was and His coming that will be.
our spirits by Thine advent here
disperse the gloomy clouds of night
and death's dark shadows put to flight.
rejoice! rejoice! Immanuel
shall come to thee, o israel.
o come to us,oh let us not forget.
abide with us,
our Lord Immanuel.
charis
