Somehow, though we repeat it each year, Christmas never seems to be a repeat of old things we did before, but rather a holiday full of mystery and the marking of time as we think back to previous Christmas celebrations.
On Christmas Eve, I think of previous Christmas Eves; different circumstances, different friends and neighbors, even different countries. And every memory is a marking of the time that is our lives.
It's hard to imagine this Jesus who was born would have time marked before and after His birth, BC and AD. The time before pointed towards Him, the time after pointed back to Him, but it was always about Him. We can't see Him, but we long to see Him. We wouldn't know Him in the simplest sense, recognizing Him if we were to pass Him on the street, but we know Him in the intimacy of accepting the truth that He knows our every thought. How can it be?
So in the hush of pondering where will we be next Christmas, who will be born, who will be more the adult than the child we see now, who will no longer be with us on this earth, all these things that mark all that life is, birth and death, all the mystery that the birth of Jesus comes forward to interrupt, we stop to worship, we give thanks. So much uncertainty in the world, yet so much peace in our hearts. The same as in the day He was born.
May this Christmas for you be filled with as much joy as the mystery of His birth. May it be one that will always cause you to look back and say I remember that year, what a wonderful year, what a Happy Christmas.
Ed and I hope for all who have been with us this year that we made your days a bit more special, filled with a bit more beauty and more thoughts about the gift of "God with us", Immanuel, still with us, as He was the night He was born.
May this coming year be filled with hope and great joy as His long-awaited promises are released into your lives.
Merry Christmas!
Ed and Rosemarie Adcock
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