A Weary World Rejoices

2020 began the way each year begins, with resolutions, goals, plans, expectations for the year ahead.  The decorations and trappings of Christmas put away, a fresh, shiny year lay ahead just waiting for whatever adventures awaited.  

It has been a year that very few people could have predicted.  Who could have imagined the upheaval and changes in our daily routines, daily interactions, and daily rhythms?  Words like "unprecedented" seem so cliché to describe what we have each endured.  

Layer upon layer, comforts, conveniences, celebrations, certainties, were all peeled away.  And it wasn't gradual.  Suddenly, it seemed, a microscopic virus shook everything up.

The griefs have been real. Celebrations cancelled, ceremonies postponed, schooling upended, socialization digitized. This on top of serious illness and unexpected death for some, and serious loss of income for others. As a wife, a mom, and a daughter, the weight my own burdens was intensified by those of my loved ones.  

Compounding the unsettling effects of all of this shaking, emotions have been high as differences of opinion on a multitude of things--from mask-wearing, to the racial tensions and issues of justice, to the usual political differences in an election year--were made so much more stark and cutting.  Such frictions have not been limited to the society at large, but have invaded even the closest relationships, disrupting harmony in families and close friendships.

The longevity of the pandemic, especially entering the darkness of winter months, makes this holiday season feel more bleak. Even with a COVID vaccine on the horizon, it is clear that we have many more months to endure this new way of life, which, by now, though depressing, does actually feel somewhat normal.  

The songs of advent describing the darkness of the world--which I have listened to for years--somehow now seem more appropriate and relatable to me.  The line from O Holy Night that reads "a thrill of hope, a weary world rejoices" is something that resonates in a new way this Christmas.  

The world is weary. Our hearts are weary.  

Yet there is a thrill of hope.  In chapter two of the book of Haggai we read the prophet's encouragement to the people of Judah as they had returned from exile and were faced with the wearying task of rebuilding the temple.  In Haggai 2:6-7 we read "For thus says the Lord of Hosts: Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land,  And I will shake all nations so that the treasures of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord of hosts."  God was reminding them that His ways and plans prevail, that even times of shaking--past, present and future--have a purpose, and the ultimate result is God's glory. 

These words can similarly speak to us today: in His sovereignty, the Lord has allowed or even ordained all the shaking of 2020—and we  can cling to the same truths that the people of Judah were reminded of:

·        God is with us.

·        He keeps His promises.

·        He has given us His Spirit.

·        We can still hope and expect to see the product of all of the “shaking” to be the glory of God. 

·        Our lives belong to the Lord.

·        The unimaginable is possible with God.

May the light of Christ's coming impact our hearts in new ways this year. Though the world feels bleak today, how much more powerful is the light when all around is dark?  While it is tempting to expect that turning the calendar to 2021 will magically bring relief from the hardships of this year, truly the only hope for lasting joy and satisfaction is found not in returning to "normal," pre-COVID ways of life, but in the "long-expected" Jesus, the one who came at long last, fulfilled God's purposes for Him on earth and opened the way for a weary and broken world to be made right with God.  May we anticipate His coming--both as we are looking back to His first advent here, and looking eagerly ahead with hope to his coming again. 

Oh Come, Oh Come, Emmanuel

O come, O come Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel

That mourns in lonely exile here

Until the Son of God appear

O come, Thou Dayspring, come and cheer

Our spirits by Thine advent here

Disperse the gloomy clouds of night

And death's dark shadows put to flight

Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel

Shall come to Thee, O Israel

O come, Desire of nations,

Bind all peoples in one heart and mind

Bid envy, strife and quarrels cease

Fill the whole world with Heaven's peace

Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel

Shall come to Thee, O Israel

Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel

Shall come to Thee, O Israel

Shall come to you, O Israel

6 Weeks in: Yielding to the Grief and Uncertainty

Now more than 6 weeks into our COVID-19 pandemic state of social isolation, we have slowly adapted to this new way of life--working from home, schooling from home, shopping from home, "seeing" people online on platforms like Zoom and FaceTime and Google Duo, worshipping at home, and--from our homes--trying to maintain productivity, academic progress, physical health and fitness, and spiritual and mental/emotional health.

It's a challenge. It's a blessing. Some days are good, some days are hard. All of this--all the change, all the blessings, all the hard, all the yuck--has its upsides and its downsides.

With 5 of us under one roof, at any given time in our home, at least one of us is likely having a harder day, including me. The no-fun days are those when I am feel stuck, discouraged, sad, lethargic and down.

Earlier in the pandemic, I was zealously clinging to the silver linings, embracing the togetherness, the learning at home, the slower pace.  I was idealizing that perhaps this should be our new normal even after the pandemic--buy a big house in the country with some land, get some horses, home school, and never really go anywhere.  I even got onto Zillow to see where we could move.

Fast forward a few more weeks, and I am more willing to let myself feel the grief.  Some days it is heavy.  This is the week we would have been in Colorado to celebrate Jared's graduation from University of Colorado at Boulder.  This would have been Anna's finals week at JMU before moving home for the summer for her internship (which--in an educational setting--is unlikely to exist this summer).  As it is, I have ordered a cake and a meal for Jared's girlfriend to pick up and for the two of them to eat together on the day he would have been walking across the stage to receive his diploma.  And, as I sit here typing this blog post, Anna is sitting by my side taking one of her finals online.

Each of us is grieving different things in different ways.

Each of us is wondering how long this will last and what the future will look like.

Each week we worship as a family at home as the rest of our church family worships simultaneously at home.  Each week I am encouraged by the Word of God, and I can embrace the truths of who He is--that He is near, that He is sovereign, that He is omniscient, that He sees and hears and knows and that nothing takes Him by surprise.  And yet, each week my heart is grieved and I find myself weepy that we are not together as a church family.

And so, I speak truth to my heart--and I have hope--and still I let myself feel the grief. I can rest in the knowledge that the future is in His hands--and I pray for our leaders to make wise decisions as we move forward--and I continue to do what each day demands.

Lord, Have Your Way

This historic worldwide disruption during the COVID-19 pandemic has had deep impacts on our lives.  Each of us has our own stories of what we have lost, what we are mourning, what is generating anxious thoughts, what social distancing looks like, and how we are coping. Each of us has lessons we are learning.

I believe that nothing takes God by surprise, and that He has purposes for everything He allows or ordains on this earth.

For me personally, this time of social isolation, social distancing, and the loss of our normal rhythms of daily life has led to introspection, processing the lessons God Has for me to learn from this time.

I have known for many years that, for me, the structure and rhythm that come from daily routines are a source of peace, comfort, and sanity.  I have written about that before (like here or here) when other things—like snow days or surgery weeks with Lilly—have disrupted our rhythms.  But this time, the interference with the patterns of our days is much more far reaching and much longer term.  And it has revealed the extent to which such structure was an idol of my heart.

It did not surprise me, therefore, when I began to feel that familiar uneasy feeling when this season of social isolation was thrust upon us so rapidly and unexpectedly.  I knew that feeling stemmed from my perceived need for some semblance of control, order, and structure.

This new paradigm offered me none of those things.

So, on day one of our attempt to start “doing school at home,” (I won’t call it “homeschooling” out of respect for family and friends who are true homeschoolers, knowing that homeschooling is an entirely different thing than what we are attempting to do right now) my tendency toward creating order and structure resulted in both of my younger girls being in tears before 9 am because of the rigidness of the schedule I was attempting to impose on all of us.

Clearly, this approach was not going to work.

I praise the Lord for helping me to quickly realize that this unexpected and highly unsettling time could either produce major unhappiness (exacerbated by my attempts to assert my version of "control"), or it could be a time to lean in and embrace the blessings it offers.

So I am learning to savor and soak in this time of slowness, of togetherness, of seeing my girls explore some new things on their own initiative.  I am learning to offer grace and patience when, on any given day, at least one amongst us (myself included) needs to know it’s OK to feel upset, it’s OK to feel a little out of sorts, it’s OK to wish things were “normal” again, it’s OK to mourn what has been lost.

Like everyone, there are things I grieved when this rapid change hit us: I had been in the throes of planning a spring women’s conference at church, ironically centered on the theme that “you are not alone.” Months of planning, praying, and hard work were seemingly all for naught.  With the gyms closed, my sense of pride and purpose in teaching fitness classes was suddenly gone.  And with the public schools and college campuses closed and Tom now teleworking, I lost any semblance of extended alone time.

But, more importantly, what have I gained?  I have gained a new perspective on God’s nearness—even in social isolation, we are not alone. I had literally just spent months studying God’s nearness to us in order to teach a group of women about it—-what a gift to have those scriptures close in my heart for this time.  I gained a fresh realization of how much I truly love my family and enjoy being together (and I am grateful because I know there are those for whom having extended time at home with family may be painful or even dangerous).  I gained a new gratitude for this time to be together. I gained a fresh appreciation for financial security and housing and clean water and soap and friendly neighbors and plenty of food and the internet--all things that are so taken for granted at other times.

And, for me personally, I am increasingly sensing that there are some parts of our new “normal” that I may like to keep permanently.  There are some things that I initially counted as losses that I am now wondering if there is not so much a reason to mourn but to embrace the shedding of some older patterns and habits to allow more space for new things God is working in my heart and life or in the heart of my family.

A verse from the book of Hosea has been popping into my mind regularly during this time:

Hosea 10:12

Sow for yourselves righteousness;

reap steadfast love;

break up your fallow ground,

for it is the time to seek the LORD,

that he may come and rain righteousness upon you.

I am asking myself what fallow ground the Lord is breaking up in my life and in my heart, and what fruit He might be wanting to produce in that fallow ground.  I am asking God to show me.

And I say “Lord, have your way.”

As we together ride out this pandemic, not knowing how long this will last or what life will look like on the other side of it, I pray that the lessons for each of us will not be wasted and there will be new growth and new life that emerges.

Holidays, Humility, Hope

Each year, the holidays give me an opportunity to savor the joys of life, to ponder my priorities and my relationships, and to consider what lies ahead.  By the end of December and into early January,  I am typically feeling  a mixture of being filled up with the joy of family time, extended family time, a extra time with special friends, mixed with fatigue and fogginess from the disruption to daily routines that the holidays bring.

So as I sit here this morning, pondering this year's Christmas celebrations, I thought I'd try to capture some of these things in words and photos.

First, here is a quick recap of our Christmas highlights for 2019.

Holidays: Our annual participation in the Christmas orchestra at church--Tom on trumpet, me on my baritone horn, and Lilly on her flute--was a source of great joy to hear all of the hours of rehearsals and practice come together in a sound that brought glory to God. And, not to be left out, Bella contributed by helping to provide childcare for orchestra and choir members' children during rehearsals.  Many thanks to our friend, Bill Bowers, for capturing some great photos!

We enjoyed Christmas Eve as a family, with both Jared and Anna home, and--for the first time in several years--Tom and I were not playing in a brass quartet for Christmas Eve candlelight services, so it was a quieter and more relaxed Christmas Eve.  Our tradition is meat fondue, cheese fondue, and chocolate fondue, and each year the kids take charge of more and more of the food prep, which is wonderful! 

We hosted my family on Christmas Day--what joy to have my parents, my brother's family, and all the dogs that come along with them all!  Laughter, good food, lots of presents, a Christmas light scavenger hunt walk, Christmas Caroling around the piano, more food, more laughter, some games....you get the idea.  The fun extended over two days as my parents and two of my nieces spent the night.  Later the next day my brother's family returned to help us eat leftovers  and we had our second annual gingerbread house decorating contest. Thanks to my lovely sister-in-law, Lita, for taking such a amazing photos!

And, as I type write now, we are driving home from our annual “Cantilina Christmas” festivities in New Jersey with Tom’s family.  Each year Tom and his siblings rotate which sibling’s family is responsible for all the planning of that year’s festivities.  This year, it was his sister Judi’s turn, and she planned a wonderful afternoon for all of us using the fellowship area of their church so there was plenty of space for all, plenty of seating around tables for the meal, and plenty of fun activities for all ages—gingerbread house decorating, Cantilina Christmas Trivia, gift exchanges from each family, and musical performance by Lilly on flute, her cousins Naomi on violin, and her Auntie Em on the flute.

Humility?  You might, at this point in this blog post, be wondering about the title that I chose.  The many holiday highlights I have just described have little to do with humility or hope. But I chose the title based on the things that were happening in my heart in the midst of all the holiday festivities.

The holidays are a much-anticipated time of year and—for me at least—it seems that most of the “normal” activities of life go on hiatus for much of the month of December as Bible studies or other weekly ministry programs wrap up, kids’ activities take a break, and schools close for a solid two weeks.  The blessing of this is much time together as a family and with friends. The flip side of all that time together can be subtle friction, frustration, and feeling frazzled.  I do not mean to suggest that our family time was fraught with lots of fighting or unpleasant interactions.  But having concentrated time with others has a way of bringing into stark focus perhaps personality or character traits we enjoy less than others.  For me, it made me more aware of my own tendency to be impatient, critical, and selfish as I related to those I love.

Hence my reference to “humility” in my title.  It is humbling when we recognize our sinful tendencies.  The realization of my heart condition brought me to a fresh place of conviction of my own sin, my need for repentance, my need for Jesus whom we have been celebrating, and my need to be daily letting my mind be renewed by the Word of God and to be walking by His Holy Spirit. It can be discouraging to be brought to a place of humility (yet again).  And yet, in Christ, we have hope that He who began a good work in us is faithful to complete it.

Hope? Not only do I need hope that there is grace for my own sin, but I have also been pondering that family gatherings also have a way of bringing into stark contrast the natural transitions that families endure as well as the aging process and changes in our physical bodies and health.  Some of the people who formerly were the young kids at family gatherings are now the young married parents bringing their own little ones.  Some of the people who were formerly those young parents with little ones are now the ones bringing their young adult children (or coming without them, if young adult responsibilities make it impossible for those young adults to travel and take the time with family).  Some of our family gatherings this year involved more walkers, less mobility, more restricted diets for some.  Some of these many kinds of changes are pure joy, and others--though they are a natural part of life's progression--can sometimes feel sad and painful and hard.  And yet, in Christ, we have hope that He holds us and our loved ones as we endure the length of our days and as we watch new generations arise.

So, while the holiday festivities are fun, and laughter with loved ones is good for the soul, I realize afresh that our true source of hope for each busy day, each increasingly rapidly passing year, and for all eternity, is Jesus.  The relationship he offers us with God the Father allows us to enjoy rest, peace, and hope that God’s work of creation, His plan of redemption, and His ongoing work in our world and in the hearts of those who are His is good, is under His control,  and is not yet finished.

We have a great and blessed hope.

We are reminded of this hope when we slow down to meditate on God's Word and the truths it contains about Him.  The holidays—with their disruption to normal routines and lack of alone time—require that we be even more intentional than usual in the daily spiritual disciplines of Bible reading and prayer.  For me, the most wonderful moments of the Christmas season were the early morning times of solitude when I sat in my dad’s old Windsor chair, now parked in our sunroom by the Christmas tree, with my Bible and my prayer journal, reflecting on God’s great power, His great love, and His amazing grace—my sources of hope for my own sin, for the people I love, and for this world we live in.

Hope is a strong motivator and a necessity as each of us navigates life—during the holidays and each day thereafter.  I praise God for the hope that we have in Christ.   And I am grateful for the examples God gives us in the Bible of others who--despite tendencies toward depression and spiritual darkness--knew where to look to find their hope.  David, the writer of most of the Psalms in the Bible wrote in Psalms 42:11 “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.”

As this holiday season comes to a close and we stride into 2020, may our hope be in the Lord as we trust Him to help us see our own sin, as we turn to Him for cleansing and renewal, and as we trust Him to do His work in our hearts, in our loved ones' lives, and in our world.

And, in case you need a reminder, as I do every year as I begin the undecorating and the normal rhythms of life begin to gear up, read this post from my archives to remember why "Christmas is Not Over."