Christmas Eve

12.24.13

     

       Christmas Eve. So many emotions associated with this season. So many hopes and dreams with Kaitlyn. 

       Things happened that morning and we decided to go to a service at Hope that we weren't originally planning to go to. Chad and Jenny joined us, and one more friend joined as well. The five of us sat in the row and listened to them retell the story of the Christ child. Of the birth of Jesus. 

       Of the baby in a manger.

        There were so many references to babies and mothers and Mary holding Jesus in her arms before the shepherds. It was... Bittersweet. Here, in this simple story that everyone retells at Christmas, was my agony and my restoration. Remembering that I was without my daughter, but also remembering that I would be reunited with her because of this baby that was born in the middle of the night in a manger. There were too many images and memories flashing around my mind as we listened and worshipped. 

        I remember thinking about the advent calendar I had been participating in through a website called "She Reads Truth" and I remember thinking that this was just my personal advent. I feel like I have always been in a state of "wait". I have been waiting for Alex to come home from deployments, waiting to change jobs, waiting to get pregnant, waiting for Alex to leave, waiting for sonograms, waiting for Alex to return, waiting for Kaitlyn, waiting for the pain to stop, waiting for Christmas, waiting for the right time to try again, waiting for restoration. John talked about how God yearned so much to be reunited with His creation, but that even He waited until the right time to bring Jesus to earth. The perfect answer and solution to every human failure. 

        I cried at the service that night. It was just too much to see the beauty and pain and be reminded of our own. Alex put his arm around me as I let the tears run down my cheeks (I never hide my tears in church, I'm just too proud). 

        We know that we will be reunited with Kaitlyn eventually. We know that that little girl is going to impact people for years to come, we have already seen glimpses of that. We know that God is good and that His plan for us is good, He promises us that. So for now, we hope. We hope for our next child to arrive safely. We hope that we can be lights in this dark world for others in desperate situations. We hope these things because we trust God. We know at the end of the day, the story of the Christ child is neither the beginning or the ending of God's story: He is the twist in the middle of the plot that keeps us going. He was the answer to the question that had been lingering, waiting for centuries. He was the promise for the future generations of a genuine, personal relationship with God.