My Overthinking

Philly Area mom, Life forever changed by adoption

He is there. He is here.

Christmas 2009. Four Christmases ago. I was a wreck. We were so close to finding our new daughter. I just knew it would be a few weeks after Christmas; I hoped it would be a few weeks after Christmas. I was filled with expectation that Christmas.

And, that meant that though I didn’t know who she was or where exactly she was, what she looked like or how old she was, I knew she was. I knew she was somewhere across the world, alone on Christmas, what turned out to be her first Christmas.

I was anxious and wondering and thinking all the time about her. Yet, there was something that gave me great peace.

God was there.

In Luke 2:6-20, Luke mentioned the manger three times. Why?

The manger was messy. It wasn’t what we picture and what our children play with as part of our little nativity sets they can hold in their hands. It wasn’t a symmetrical wooden contraption with a sweet bed of hay. It was more like a box looking thing or basin made out of clay mixed with hay or stones and held together with mud. All kinds of food for animals was put into it, not just nice yellow hay. It was dirty, likely moldy, smelly, not anything we’d want our child anywhere near.

And, God was there. Very literally, God was there.

As spunky and full of life as Lydia is now, there was a time that she was in a pretty messy place. I believe her orphanage was one of the better ones—her needs were met, and we’ve learned that there were quite caring women who took to her there. There was a wall of windows with natural light in the room where she lived 24-7. In that room were 40 cribs and a few toys for all to share to pass their days until they graduated to another room and then another. There were older children in that orphanage too, children we weren’t allowed to see. I wonder what their days were like.

I’ve heard a lot of stories, stories about adopted children who flinch when someone moves their direction in fear that they will be hit; children with flat heads who were never held; children who have come to accept that no one wants to bring home a child their age, only babies; children who suffer significant consequences from not having the medical treatment they needed earlier.
And, yet, I believe God is there.

God is not only not afraid to get his feet dirty; He is about getting His feet dirty. That’s what advent is all about, isn’t it? God coming down, the perfect to the broken, the holy to the unholy.

Psalm 34:18 tells us He’s close to the brokenhearted, and there are so many, so very many. I can only imagine that He is very close indeed to brokenhearted children—here and there—whether they are aware of their brokenness or not. He’s there.

I prayed for our daughter four Christmases ago, that He would be close to her, that He would remain close to her. That He would be tangibly felt in that room where she slept. That He would wrap His arms around her when she was cold. That He’d rock her when she needed comfort. That He’d be in the manger with her.

I know He was there.

And, somehow, in the dark places of orphanages around the world, I can’t explain how or what He always looks like there, but I believe that He’s there. In the warmth of the sun pouring in the windows, He comforted my child. In the smile of a nanny. In the gaze of another orphan. In the provision sent by charities around the world. In her broken heart—emotionally and literally.

Somehow, He was there.

Now, as my children listen to us read about His story every night, sing familiar and unfamiliar words together to prepare, sneak Hershey kisses in their mouths as we make reindeer eyes, and use entirely too much scotch tape on crafts and wrapping paper alike, He is here…and, He is there, somehow making an unholy place, holy.

That’s what advent is about. That’s what He’s about.

photos courtesy of KC Photography

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I believe in bridges

from bridge1Every time we drove over this bridge, he’d say he loved this spot. It really was beautiful. The water moved fast, and everything else always seemed beautifully still. I took this picture as I drove over that bridge without him once. With four children in the car, I pulled over to the side on that old bridge and texted him a modern postcard, a little “I know you love this place and now so do I.”

The bridge is a humble bridge, made even more humble by what surrounds it. While it isn’t worthy of a picture with its layers of paint, chipping bolts, and repair scars, there’s something remarkable about it simply by definition of what it is. Bridges amaze me. They are long thought out and planned for; every detail is accounted for. Their construction is time consuming, labor intensive, and costly. All that because a bridge needs to be safe; it’s no good if it is not. A bridge makes a way where there is no way. Even the most humble bridge becomes beautiful when you see it that way.

We’ve been reading this month together, sometimes reading stories that seemingly had nothing to do with Christmas. Joseph and his technicolor dream coat? A big tower people built to try to reach heaven? Where’s the wee three kings? Where’s the heavenly angels singing? But, every story we’ve read and every story we haven’t read were all part of God’s long thought out plan, every detail accounted for. All of it led to the perfect blueprint for the most remarkable bridge, expertly executed as only He could do. This God, our God, He made a way where there was no way because He’s a waymaker. That baby born on Christmas, the one the kings sought out to find, the ones the angels sang about, and the one that stirred Herod’s jealous heart, He’s the bridge. And, all these stories help us better understand the bridge rather than simply focusing on the world around it, and they help us see how desperately we need that bridge and how stuck we would be without it.

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Preparing for Christmas Through Song {advent hymns}

advent candle picIt all started with a lullaby back in early November.

She requested a song, and I can’t help but accept the invitation. As I cradled her in my arms, the only song that came to mind was Away in a Manger. So, I sang it, all the verses I could remember. She was quiet while I sang, intently listening to every word. As soon as I finished, she asked “What’s that song?” and “What’s lowing?” and “morning night? What’s that mean?”

I decided then, before we even had our Halloween decorations put away, that we were going to add something new to advent this year. My children knew all the words to It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas but had never heard of the song Good Christian Men, Rejoice. So, I made a list of 25 songs that I wanted to sing together, some more familiar than others but all with words that really mean something.

Every night, after we read together, we sing together. I print out two copies of as many verses of the songs that I can find online, one copy for the girls and one for the boys. We sing a verse, Lydia always trailing about one second behind as she tries to follow the words we’re singing, and then we pause and I explain what the words mean, words like “word of the Father, now in flesh appearing” and “ever o’er its Babel sounds the blessed angels sing.” Then, we sing another verse and do it again. And, as we sing together and Mark and I try our best to explain what seems hard to understand even for us, we have been realizing what we’re singing and what we’re teaching. It’s the gospel. These songs are full of the gospel.

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found…

Christmas songs aren’t all lullabies about a sweet baby who doesn’t cry (though Away in a Manger is Lydia’s favorite still, and the way she sings it is my favorite still: “…the little Lord Jesus sleeps on his head…”). Christmas songs tell the story of Jesus beyond the manger onto the cross and beyond the grave. That’s the story that makes Christmas what it is.

We still sing and dance to Jingle Bells with the rest of them. And, this fam’s got some moves, people. But, we know that the reason we are able to sing and dance with “exultation” is because of the bigger story. And, the hymns are helping us all remember it.

Advent songs - myoverthinking

 

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Today is the day of big things

They had started strong. When God called the Israelites, His chosen people, back to Jerusalem after 70 years of exile in Babylon, they were feverish about doing His work. His goodness and enduring love was their rally cry as they got to work rebuilding the temple that the Babylonians had destroyed. But, something happened as the temple started to take form. Some of the older generation who remembered the grandeur of Solomon’s temple wept as they looked upon the new structure and compared it to what used to be. They knew that as a remnant people with very little to offer, this new temple would not even come close to what they had had before. And, I wonder if they suspected that God’s blessing to them wouldn’t be matched as well.

The beautiful and fervent collaborative work of God’s people slowed down, eventually stopping entirely. For 16 years, in fact, God’s people went about their lives, building up their land and businesses again, likely walking by the temple construction site everyday that now looked like ruins. I wonder if they walked by that site and felt like they were looking at a mirror to their hearts, hearts that had been stirred by God but now were dormant and dusty towards Him. They must have turned their heads to look away as they walked by and were reminded.

big thingsBut, God was after those dusty broken hearts still. He didn’t leave them alone in their seemingly hopeless mess. God spoke through the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, calling His people who had returned to Jerusalem to now return to Him. God told them that He could make their mountain-sized obstacles like plains before them (Zechariah 4:7). He assured them that those who had led them as they started their building campaign would see it through to completion and that those who had felt that they were simply living in the day of small things (Zechariah 4:10a) would be changed as they saw the big things happening in front of them.

The advent season stirs us, and our strings of memories aren’t unlike the tangled strings of Christmas lights. As we try to make sense of the seemingly hopeless mess before us, we may feel like the Israelites did, like God is like the ghost of Christmas past and that whatever big things He used to do in us and for us are no more. But, God is never not working to draw us closer to Him. He never stops inviting us into His Kingdom work. We are never stuck in a day of small things because He’s always a God of big things. Today, this day, what may seem just like a normal day, today is the day of big things.

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