The Awaited Child

Christmas came early in our house this year with a phone call and a question. A question we wholeheartedly said yes to, and felt peace and excitement fill our hearts. Ten tiny toes. Tiny fingers grasping my own. The deep sighs and delicious weight of baby sleep resting on my chest. Those are some of the things that I sit here enjoying once again and I marvel at the perfection in my arms. This little present came wrapped in warm blankets to the keep the cold at bay and was delivered to my front door. My two eager boys crowded around as I opened the wrapping and there in all his 3 week old wonder lay our new foster miracle. He cracked his little eyes open, looked directly at my 4 year old and his face broke into a huge grin. Then, he turned his gaze to my 6 year old and rewarded him with another grin, before turning back to me and closing his eyes with a peaceful sigh. Our long awaited child is home. For as long as God has planned for him to stay and we are in awe of His Gift. 

Each year, as Christmas approaches, I spend a lot of time in reflection on the year that is almost past and meditation on the meaning of Advent. I love to keep the first Christmas at the forefront of my thoughts. It’s simplicity and significance bringing perspective to a celebration that can so easily be buried in the consumerism and busyness that threatens to overtake us at this time every year.  But this Advent season has been different than any other I have experienced. Never before have I felt more keenly the wonder that is Advent or had a more vivid picture of what the birth of Jesus really meant than I have this year. The waiting. The anticipation. The Joy. This year, perhaps it is my own journey, my own waiting for a child, that has deepened my awareness. 

The past year has been hard. A bittersweet mixture of grief and happiness and the one thing that has punctuated almost every second of every day of 2018 – waiting. After we released our last foster baby to his mother’s care, my joy at their reunion was swiftly swallowed by rolling waves of my own loss and grief. It thrust me back into a place of struggling to trust God and His Plan once again. Some days the sun rose, but the dark clouds hanging over my head would not break for me to see it. Other days, it’s brightness was blinding reflected in the blessings that surround me in my family and friends. But one thing remained constant – Hope. I was still waiting for the answer to my heart’s cry, trusting that God’s Timing is impeccable.

I know my own longing is but a very small taste of what the nation of Israel must have felt as they awaited the arrival of the Messiah. I have waited such a short time compared to the generations that waited. Waited for deliverance. Waited to hear the voice of God speak once again. Can you imagine? It had been 400 years since the words of the prophet Malachi had been proclaimed. 400 turbulent years of silence filled with struggle and oppression. Years of crying out to God for their Deliverer.  And yet He waited. For the right moment. Babies were born, grew up and and eventually stooped low with age, but still there was no sign of Him. Each generation of women dreamed of being His mother. The men dreamed of marching at His back as He rode to Victory over their enemies. But still God waited. And so, the people waited. Waited in hope of their coming King’s arrival. 

They waited and wondered. Questioned and cried. All the while God, working behind the scenes, putting in place what no one could see, prepared the way for His Son to enter the world. Then, when the season was right, He began to reveal His plan. Quietly whispering this beautiful secret into a young girl’s heart and planting the Seed in her womb. Instilling courage into the man who would take the name of “Father” to believe the unbelievable. Moving a Roman Governor with the need to conduct a census, making the way for the city of David to become the birthplace of His Son. Timing their arrival just right, so that a stable and not a palace would welcome His first cry. Working until everything was just right. And then… Suddenly, it was Time! With an angel’s call to poor shepherds, His arrival was announced! The chaos that ensued! The Joy that must have erupted at the news! The astonishment. Could it be true? Was this actually happening? Was the wait of the centuries finally at an end? And the stable filled with the press of bodies, of  jubilant hearts, gazing with solemn reverence on the face of the Awaited One, carefully swaddled and lying in the hay.

Oh, to have been there and seen what unfolded that night! My experiences this past week can only help me to imagine how it might have been. Did the shepherds jostle and trip over each other as they crowded around the Babe to peer into the manger, much the same way my own boys eagerly pushed their way to peer into the car seat at my front door? Did the streets of Bethlehem ring with the shepherds’ joyful shouts of “He’s here! He’s here!” much the same as the halls of my own home echoed with the sound of my children’s excited voices? Did Mary’s heart swell in amazement at the wonder of the child in her arms much as mine did as I picked up our foster baby for the first time? Did a deep Peace settle over the stable and those within it as they accepted and marveled at their roles to play in the life of the Babe they stood admiring? 

I have never been so humbled by the Christmas story. Never felt closer to the Manger. Never been so deeply affected by the fact that God Himself chose to put on the fragility and innocence of an infant to make His way to earth. To me. He chose to come in a way that others did not plan for Him. Yet the Father deemed it perfect. God speaks to us in ways that we can understand. And this Christmas for me, as He did that first Christmas, He chose to speak through a baby.

As I cradle this precious Little Gift, I remember in Whose Arms I am carried. As I feed him, I remember Who provides for my every need. When I lay him down at night to sleep, watching him quietly breathing, I remember Who watches over me. And as I let the tears leak from my eyes and spill down my cheeks, already so in love with this little life, and hoping only good things for his future, I remember that my Father’s Love is deeper still and His plans for me are perfect.

Like the rainbow was for Noah and the generations to follow, this baby in my arms, this long awaited child, is a constant reminder of the Faithfulness of God. A reminder that Christ is not just in Christmas. He is here in every day. The Awaited One has come. Emmanuel. God with us. And with His coming, we became the awaited ones. Now, it is He that waits for us.  Waits for us to trust. To follow. To let Him lead us in the dark places of life, when we can’t see where we are going or what to expect. Trusting that He has heard the cries of our hearts and will answer. Even when we have to wait for what seems like forever. Like Hannah, waiting for Samuel. Elizabeth for John. Sarah for Isaac. He alone holds our time in His Hands. And when we place ourselves in those Hands in Surrender, He can work wonders that we can’t even imagine! 

Tonight I hold a Gift. A reminder that the best things are worth waiting for. Sometimes that wait can be long. I know I am not here because of anything I have done. Or because my moments of impatience or complaint have somehow worked this miracle. I am here because it was Time. I am here because, regardless of my flaws and imperfection, I am exactly what this Little One needs for right now.  And I will rejoice in the moments that I have with him. I prayed for this child, before I even knew him, so I know Who directs his path. He was expected. He was awaited. And now he is cherished. For how ever long we have.

So, my prayer for you as we come to the end of the year is this: that you would “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19). May the Awaited One be revealed to you in a powerful way this Christmas and your New Year be filled with the wonder of what He has yet in store for you! Merry Christmas!!!

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
Luke 2:11