It was so special to have Charlotte during the Advent season… to, in some small way, walk Mary’s walk.
Some things we have to take a field trip to begin to realize.
There’s no way to describe the end of pregnancy; the anxiety, the exhaustion, the weariness and the waiting…
Oh the waiting. We want to know the hour and the day when we will have relief; when we will return to the physical comfort “that was.” We begin to wonder if that will ever really happen.
And we wait. Because that’s all we can do. So we wait as the whole world waits.
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. – Romans 8
And then lo and behold, she does come.
We look her over, her every part… and no mind can comprehend that those fingers, those toes were all formed, hidden and waiting to be revealed.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be. – Psalm 139
Even having felt her move, I would not have believed it had I not watched her appear with my own eyes.
Still, as I wonder over her frailty- her paper thin skin, her weak, new muscles and her untrained eyes- I am thinking of Him. Tiny Him who came just like this, not so many years ago.
No mind can comprehend the possibility of this God-baby; that God would make himself so vulnerable, so small, so submissive. But I now know miracles happen every day because on December 2nd I witnessed the unseen revealed. (And on August 30th and July 1st and July 3rd and May 13th.) I felt my body’s instant relief and return to what was… the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn… o night when Christ was born…
It is amazing how a new birth slingshots us from a season of restlessness to a season of peace and calm. Things that seemed so important before gently shrink to their proper proportions. Even in the midst of late night feedings, my sleep is more sound, my spirit light, my heart thankful… a good reminder that no matter how hard this life might get over the next several years He is coming again and there will be relief for a weary world. Charlotte has been a good reminder that when we celebrate Christmas we are not just celebrating what was, but what is and is to come… when we light the advent candles we are not waiting in memory, but in the present… and we are not waiting in vain for He will come again, in the blink of an eye, like a thief in the night though the wait has seemed long.
