Christmas Day 7 years ago, I was broken and hurting like I had never been before. The shards of what my life used to be lay all around me and it felt nearly impossible to put the pieces back together and heal from such a disaster. Yet, I also believed in a God who redeems and restores, a God who makes all things new again, a God who makes beauty out of ashes. This was the God I needed to come through for me. This is the God I have been trusting in the last 7 years. Now I have to be honest, this has not always been easy for me. There have been a million late night conversations where I am asking God to make good on that part of his character. When I didn’t know what to pray, sometimes my prayers would simply be a whisper of “redeem this”. I have spent many countless nights thinking about redemption and what that could look like in my story. Is it even possible for me, my boys and everyone else involved?
I have spent countless hours telling God the versions of redemption that I think would make the most sense for us. In the early years, the original version was that my marriage was restored and my children could grow up with a present dad in their lives. I soon realized that was probably not the version that would ever come out of this story. So I wrote down another version of redemption that I would accept. A redemption story of a new man coming into our lives, loving my kids as his own, caring and providing for me in all the ways I need, spiritually, physically and emotionally. Now this is the story of redemption that I am sold in the movies that supposedly comes so easily. In fact, I have watched many friends and family find this version of their story. I have asked God over and over again why that is not the story me and my boys get to have. Yet, the answer I keep hearing is for me to open my mind a bit wider and to think bigger, think more eternal and less Hallmark. So do I just sit here and wait for God to show up in that specific way, or do I open my eyes to the million other ways that God is moving and working around me? As I have prayed for God to show me his redeeming nature at work in my life, he answers me in the most unexpected ways.
I stand in front of a group of 100 people leading an international student ministry and see people from all over the world and all faith backgrounds being loved and welcomed into our community and I hear my God whisper, “this is it”
I sit in my office as students weep and share their hard stories of trauma and heartache, and the empathy that is so easily accessible pours out of me to truly listen and love them, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.
I sit alone on the floor with scripture opened in the darkness of morning and feel the sweet friendship of Jesus and his love for me, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.
I drive home to glorious display of colors and beauty as the daylight escapes behind the horizon, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.
I see my children growing in empathy and kindness to those who are hurting, having experienced heartache themselves, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.
I share life with women who have been abandoned, abused and discarded, never really finding a safe place in the church, yet still teaching me and mentoring me how to hold fast to Jesus through it all, and I hear my God whisper “this is it”.
Redemption arrives in the Christmas story in the most unlikely of ways. The Christmas story is raw and full of rejected and broken people. You see desperation and fear and our God entering into the realm of the chaos, choosing to become fragile and weak himself. Jesus is our Emmanuel, God with us. He didn’t choose a palace or to be born into a family of the highest religious officials of the day. He rejected power and greed, and embraced humanity at the lowest level, an infant. He became as dependent as he could on imperfect people whom He had created and formed in his own image. For me, Christmas is that reminder of hope and joy being found in the worst of circumstances. For many, the Christmas spirit feels so far away this time of year. Its hard for them to find peace, joy and hope when their life looks completely broken. I get that feeling. Yet the beauty of the Christmas story is that its not about the perfect circumstances or the perfect people. A lowly manger scene with a poor family who quickly become refugees fleeing to a foreign land to escape genocide is not an ideal #blessed Christmas. Yet the angels rejoice and the shepherds and wise men from afar are still drawn to this scene, to this family. God is still moving and redeeming his people.
If you are feeling alone this Christmas, not loving the story that you are living, take heart that there is God who enters into that story anyway. There is a God who redeems and restores in ways that are deeper and richer than you can imagine. It may not be in the way you are wishing. I am reminded of the passage in Luke 24, where two disciples are talking about Jesus and how they were disappointed in how he didn’t do what they wanted them to do. Literally Jesus himself is standing before them in a resurrected body and they don’t recognize him. They tell Jesus that “we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel”. They were looking for redemption in the wrong places. They were looking for their own version of what they were hoping for, not the one right in front of them. Despite not overthrowing the corrupt Roman empire, Jesus absolutely redeemed Israel and the rest of the world, with his life, death and resurrection. He humbly laid down his life out of great love and conquered death. He brought an everlasting hope to his followers that could not be shaken.
Redemption most often doesn’t show up in elegant displays of might, power and dramatic transformation. It comes quietly, in small sacred ways that we must look for or we might just miss it. We might be looking for a big grand story that doesn’t exist, when maybe the one right in front of us is just as beautiful if we take a closer look.
Sound of Surviving 