Great joy for all the people

I didn't write and send Christmas cards this year. While I had been whittling the list down for a few years now anyway, this year it just felt like there were too many financial needs around us to justify the printed photos and stamps. And if there's anything that 2020 taught us, it's who our community is. That community has remained close and they know all the highlights of our year. They know our lowest points. And they were there through it all. They didn't need a piece of paper they'll throw out in January to tell them anything new.

This Christmas season I've been meditating on the angel's words in Luke 2:10...

"Do not be afraid. 

I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people."

2020 is the year that fear became fashionable. Having spent many years of my life letting fear and anxiety drown me, I refused to go back there. And knowing the influence a parent can have on a child's levels of fear and anxiety, I determined to do everything I could to not allow them to live in fear. We didn't live with our heads in the sand; we didn't live recklessly or unwise. We masked up in public and we stood on our dots when out-and-about. However, we also talked about the science of viruses, risk factors, and immune systems. We did what we could to build up ours. We remembered the One who knows the day and cause of every sickness that was going to be allowed to trigger that immune system and yes, who ultimately knows the day and cause of our demise. We don't need to live in fear of that; it's good news that causes great joy! 

We have learned that one of the best antidotes for fear is service. So we kept our eyes and ears open. Any time we got the hint or a nudge that someone was struggling, we stepped in to bring that good news that causes great joy. As a ministry partner of mine used to tell me, there are people who have to fabricate pain (sleeping on nails, going on long pilgrimages, not eating or drinking) to experience the pain that Christ told us will be ours as we serve. When, like Him, we step into the brokenness and darkness, we won't need to try to fabricate anything. But surprisingly, the result is "great joy for all the people" - for the one who serves and those who are being served. 

There are plenty of people struggling physically, yes - but even more so struggling emotionally and spiritually. Hidden behind masks, socially distanced, and isolated, forgotten by Christians too frightened to let them in. But the good news that causes great joy is for all the people. As Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." (Mark 2:17) 

So this year we mourned with those who mourned. We rejoiced with those who rejoiced. We tried to bring hope to those for whom hope had been shattered. Where division was great and overpowering, we tried to remember Romans 12:18, "If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone." We fail sometimes but we tried to give grace for every belief, comfort level, and opinion.

We cannot control or change what others say about us. We cannot control or change the lies they tell or the chaos they leave in their wake. We can control how we react. We can control what we do with the hurt. And as far as it depends on each of us, we can choose to live at peace with everyone. It's good news that will cause great joy!

How can that be? Because the same God who chose to send a tiny baby to a stable in Bethlehem and who then chose to announce that to shepherds with the statement, "Do not fear," followed by news that causes great joy, that same God just as intricately orchestrates every single moment of each of our lives. Everything.

Three years ago, I read a devotional written by Shane Claiborne where he said, 

"Let’s remember this Christmas that the Savior we celebrate was born into the crap. He couldn’t care less whether we say “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Holidays”. He’s much more interested in us getting dirty in the trenches than decorating the Temple. What Jesus cares about is how we care for the most vulnerable people on earth—the widows and orphans, the immigrants and refugees, the sick and the homeless.

The world we live in, like the world Christ lived in, is ravaged with violence and poverty. But the good news is that a Savior is born. He has come to preach good news to the poor and to disturb the rich. He has come to cast the mighty from their thrones and to lift up the lowly. He has come to bind up the brokenhearted and proclaim freedom to the captives.

He has come to remind us that God is with us—if we are with the poor."

- (Keep Watch with Me Daily Advent Reader)

Merry Christmas and may your 2021 be filled with a message of "do not fear" for those who need to hear good news that causes great joy!

As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Joshua 24:15