This is the first year my oldest kids voiced their understanding that waiting for Christmas was what made the day so special when it finally came.
Anticipation is a powerful joy-multiplier.
And in many ways, the time of looking forward to this holiday is a gift of time given to look inward, back, and forward –
INWARD at our hearts and lives, making careful evaluation, taking stock of whether we truly understand and cherish the gift of a Christ given to us, preparing room in our hearts just as He made room in His for us, welcoming His reign and inviting Him as rightful King of our lives.
BACK at the astonishing mercy on a broken human race who needed a Savior, expected a Conqueror, and got both – but not as they expected. The Utmost King humbled Himself to become a fragile baby born in scornful scandal and rejected even before His birth – “no room for them at the inn.”
Outcasts and celestial beings both worshipped at His birth: All are welcome, and worship is the only appropriate response.
FORWARD to the time to come when He will return to dwell among His people once more, this time not as sacrificial Lamb but reigning Lion, when the celebration will be unprecedented and truly, deeply glorious and the joy will be perfect.
Our anticipation of Christmas is a picture of the anticipation we should hold in our hearts every day – He has come and He will come again.
We anticipate Christmas with a mere shadow of the true and weighty joy that is to come.
Recently, I saw a hilarious announcement: the owner of a company had a great plan! He was dressing up as Willy Wonka (complete with purple top hat and floppy golden bow tie), and had a handful of “Golden Tickets” which gave the recipient free goods and bonus just-released items. He was going to put the tickets randomly in various orders that were made that day.
It was a unique and creative way to encourage business!
Although you probably already know about Willy Wonka, the reference is from a children’s book by Roald Dahl, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It is a fantastical, imaginative tale about a young boy from a very poor family who finds a golden ticket in a chocolate bar. The ticket grants the bearer a special tour of an amazing and mysterious candy factory run and owned by the eccentric millionaire Willy Wonka. There are only five tickets hidden in specific chocolate bar wrappers, and are greatly coveted and sought after by thousands of young hopefuls.
The five children who win the Golden Tickets and arrive for the tour later discover that they are the five candidates for Willy Wonka’s replacement – he wants to retire and the tour is in actuality a sort of interview to determine who the next owner of the factory will be.
Only one can emerge the new heir, and the series of events in the chocolate factory tour show that it will need to be a very uniquely qualified person indeed.
Who doesn’t love the idea of winning a “Golden Ticket”?
Especially if it was unexpected and entirely unmerited through your own effort or talent!
Going from a gritty and gray daily grind to suddenly having an entirely new opportunity that includes joy, creativity, pleasure, authority, and wealth – what an incredible prospect!
So guess what? For anyone who is a follower of Christ, you are already the winner of a Golden Ticket!
Granted sudden and immediate access to God through Jesus’ sacrifice, you’re invited into the Kingdom. And not only as a tourist or a day-visitor: You have been invited to become part of God’s Kingdom operations – given the work of growing and furthering it (Daniel 7:18).
And it wasn’t random chance that you received this ticket. Nope! You were hand-selected by God, chosen and called (Ephesians 1:4), because He sees you, knows you, and loves you. And He wanted you to be the one specifically in charge of the work He prepared for you before time began (Ephesians 2:10).
This Kingdom work is so multi-faceted and so greatly varied that there is plenty of space for everyone who is called to have their own particular area of operations. For me right now, this means taking a good hard look at the roles I have currently been given (mama and wife, homemaker, teacher/mentor, friend…) then, with passion, focus, and humility, getting up each day to fill those roles with all the strength and ability He helps me to have.
What roles and what work have been assigned to you in this time? Whatever it is, be encouraged to do it with all your strength (Ecclesiastes 9:10), knowing that you’ll be giving a project report on it at some point (Hebrews 4:13).
There is a brighter time coming, when we will reign with Him (2 Timothy 2:12, Romans 8:17). For right now, it’s like the part where we are faithfully learning and training as apprentices or interns. So we must not lose heart, even when it seems like the gray and the grit of our current circumstances are more real than the fact of a gleaming Golden Ticket in our hand.
Each person who won a Golden Ticket didn’t automatically receive the right to ownership of the Chocolate Factory by staying where they were – they had to act on the promise it gave, and show up on the appointed day to be allowed inside!
We can hold onto the same hope – knowing that the gate will swing open for us and we will be welcomed in, for we have been given a hope that is certain:
Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise. (Hebrews 10:23, NLT)
We just need to keep faithfully showing up.
Can’t wait to be heirs of the “Chocolate Factory” with you, my friend!
– Maria
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What is it about transformation stories that draw us in and get us so excited?
One of my favorite movies is the 1964 musical romance film “My Fair Lady“, an Academy Award winner. It tells the story of a conceited phonetics expert, Professor Higgins (played by Rex Harrison), who accepts a bet that he can change an ignorant Cockney working-class girl into a cultured lady who can pass for a member of high society. Audrey Hepburn played the initially grimy and raucous Eliza Doolittle, who by the end of her tutorship becomes transformed into an elegant, lovely woman mistaken for royalty.
After undergoing 6 months of rigorous training and tutoring, Eliza not only manages to charm and delight members of aristocracy, she also attracts the attentions of a handsome, high-bred suitor!
Trying to understand where she truly belongs, she returns to the surroundings where she lived before her transformation. But she discovers that she no longer fits in there. In fact, she has become unrecognizable to her former friends and acquaintances! Her change has become too complete – she is like an entirely new person and must learn to live with the life her metamorphosis now requires.
Isn’t this just like what our lives shouldresemble?
For anyone who chooses to follow Christ as Lord and Savior, the old ways of speaking, thinking, behaving, and presenting ourselves should be so deliberately given up to the “new management” of the Spirit of God that we become entirely changed.
No area of our lives should be withheld – we are called to represent Christ as His ambassadors, and as such need to allow His guidance, correction, and teaching to shape and mold us to what will most reflect His brilliance and wisdom.
Eliza’s natural intelligence, perseverance, and the strengths of her character were not diminished or overshadowed by her rigorous training – it actually allowed them to shine more clearly and winsomely. By the end of the film, she has become an indispensable part the household, and to Professor Higgins in particular as he confesses, “I’ve grown accustomed to her face.”
The same should be true for us. When we submit humbly to the (sometimes) grueling, repetitive tutoring and teaching that we agree to as servants and disciples of Christ, we are allowing Him to polish off the rough edges and pieces that detract from who we were made to be. We only become more of who we really are – in a beautiful, attractive, and appealing way – so as to show off our Master’s glorious skill. We become trusted, valuable members of His household, familiar with His ways and more at ease with our new role and expectations of behavior.
“…Christ’s love controls us. Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have all died to our old life. He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them.” 2 Corinthians 5:14-15, NLT
We shouldn’t be able to return to the ‘old’ lives or comfortable with the old selves we were before coming to Christ. We should be so changed that we can only live lives that are in harmony with our transformation.
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
2 Corinthians 5:17, NLT
Like Eliza, I want to be a stunning transformation. I want to show a humble, diligent, and eagerly teachable heart, becoming a person who brings honor and acclaim to my exceptional Teacher. There is no greater joy than to fully trust in our “Professor”, allowing Him to shape and mold us to who He created us to be, throwing off the old with its abrasive, grimy, and crass behavior and walking in the new with grace, poise, loveliness, and beauty.
I’m so grateful for this glorious purpose and His promise to faithfully bring this transformation to completion (Phil 1:6), aren’t you?
The elegant, beautiful “Miss Eliza Doolittle” at the Embassy Ball, where she is mistaken for foreign royalty due to her impeccable speech and manners.
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What does it take to create a true connection and communication? How can a family be created from strangers?
In People of the Deer, author Farley Mowat writes about his experience of living among the last surviving people of the Ihalmiut in the tundra of northern Canada. A people who lived traditionally and almost entirely off the migrating caribou herds, they had warmly welcomed Mowat into their camp.
Farley was delighted by the opportunity to learn from and experience the way these unknown and isolated people lived, but there was a significant problem: He spoke no Ihalmiut, nor did they speak any English. Initially they communicated brokenly through an interpreter who had learned some of their dialect, but the man was leaving the Barrens for good. It seemed pointless for Mowat to stay if communication was not possible.
Mowat made a decision: despite being told that their language was complex and incredibly difficult to master, he would learn it, as best he could.
This decision became the pivotal point in the relationship between him and the Ihalmiut people.
He writes that when he acted out his desire to learn their language to the two Ihalmiut men who had befriended him, the effect was astonishing. Once they understood what he meant, they in turn emphatically and repeatedly acted out complete acceptance of him as an adopted member of their people, claiming that he was now one of the Ihalmiut.
Humbled and deeply moved by the unexpected love these people showed an outsider, Mowat resolved to study their language with great effort. He was surprised to find, in the months following, he was able to make rapid progress and began communicating quickly. He was pleased by the seeming ease with which he mastered the basics of their language.
Somewhat arrogant about his success, Mowat tells of an encounter about a year later: Encountering a man who was a member of another related people group, he casually made a long, complicated remark in Ihalmiut – and was met with utter bewilderment. The man had no idea what Mowat was saying: it was unintelligible gibberish.
Mowat came to realize the stunning truth: the people of the Ihalmiut had deliberately created an extremely simplified version of their language to allow him to communicate with them.
Not only had this “pidgin” Ihalmiut been developed and used by the two men who were his self-assigned tutors, they had made sure the entire tribe used this simplified form of language!
The Ihalmiut language was incredibly sophisticated, with many distinct nuances and multiple precise tenses – all of which would have been too hard for him. He would have given up in discouragement immediately if he had tried to learn their language as it actually was.
Because of the love of these people for a complete stranger, and their whole-hearted acceptance and kindness in adopting him as family, they all willingly changed their language to allow him to live among them.
This is a story of unconditional love, undeserved kindness, and grace.
This is also a picture of the breath-taking love God has shown us.
In stunning kindness to us, this all-powerful, all-knowing Being chose to create a “pidgin” language to help communicate with us – He came to us as a human, Jesus Christ.
His Spirit inspired men to write in human words to help us attempt to comprehend Him, His character, and explain His glory. Yet even the most exquisite words can give only a feeble sense of His nature, His worth, His power and holiness.
It is when we make a decision to pursue a relationship with Him that everything we previously knew shifts. He knows we cannot grasp the extent of His greatness. He knows that we cannot fully comprehend the magnitude of His worth. But when we have taken that first step of stating our desire for relationship with Him despite the impossible challenge – He sees our feeble attempt and roars with joy as He rushes to meet us.
As we move toward Him, awkward and faltering, He exuberantly reaches out to us with His arms wide open and an enormous smile of joyous welcome. Declaring we are His forever and assuredly a member of His family, we are loved and accepted completely and finally.
There is no percentage in this relationship we can take any credit for – He gave us life, gave us the desire to seek Him, and then enabled the connection through Jesus’ sacrifice. This is no “lion’s share” of relationship. This is the entire share.
Why? Because He is love (1 John 4:8-10). And encountering this mind-blowing loveliness of God is what give us our greatest joy, deepest delight, and purest pleasure (Psalm 16:11, 36:8).
May we all come to a place where we, though awkward, stammering outsiders, experience the richness of love and kindness that makes us family with our King, though we have done nothing to deserve it.
The Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son.
John 1:14, NLT
-Maria
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Do you ever watch fairy-tale movies? The ones with a beautiful girl who is courageous and good and finally overcomes incredible odds and adversity and marries the prince/handsome rich guy?
I do. I like those kind of films. Happy endings are my jam.
What’s hard to do is come back to reality and try to reset my mind to cope with my very unmagical, daily grind involving dust, dirty diapers, lint, and bickering children who must be fed. Often.
“Happy endings are for fairy-tales,” the cynic in your mind may mutter. “Life is hard and then you die.” (This is an actual quote from one of my parents.)
But.
According to the Bible, I am told that no one can even imagine the wonderful things that are being prepared for us (1 Corinthians 2:9), that this world is merely a prelude to a New Heavens and Earth (Isaiah 65:17, Revelation 21:1), and that our King is actually preparing a grand (re)entrance into our world (Titus 2:13, Hebrews 9:28) – just like the crescendo of any fairy-tale ending.
The truth is: we ARE living in a sort of fairy-tale.
Our hope in this life is anchored in a tale of epic love, betrayal, loss, redemption, and (ultimately) victory. We have been promised that happy ending, and what’s important in the meantime is how we maintain our perspective and courage as we wait and hope for the return of our King and the righting of all that is wrong.
(I recommend reading the Jesus Storybook Bible, by Sally Lloyd Jones, for a comprehensive view of this better-than-fairy-tale story, if you haven’t already.)
As I explained to my children the other day after watching one such fairy-tale film together, it’s as if this present world is set at the end of the movie, immediately before the happy ending.
The curse is broken, the spell is lifted, the evil is defeated – but it’s in those few seconds where all the darkness and sadness still hold that we live for now.
We are in the space just before the turn of events, where the hope appears crushed and the grief feels crushing. Bewildered, aching, it breaks our hearts and feels so wrong.
We are in that slice of time where we don’t see the truth yet.
But that doesn’t make it less true.
If we can be patient and hopeful, knowing that in just a little bit, the sun will rise and the light will break out. The wrong will be set right, and all that was hopeless and grim will be transformed and renewed. We will experience the delight and sheer joy that comes from living this glorious happy ending:
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old heaven and the old earth had disappeared. And the sea was also gone. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.
I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”
And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.”
(Revelation 21:1-5, NLT)
That hope is something worth holding on to, tight, no matter what the cynics may say or the darkness around may seem like.
And that, to me, is better than any fairy-tale ending I could ever imagine.
I’m astounded by this fascinating, tiny-but-mighty creature found in the desert areas of southwestern USA and northwestern Mexico.
But wait, there’s more!
The Grasshopper Mouse has an incredible resistance to the toxin injected by the bark scorpions it hunts, meaning that it barely notices when it is stung!
Unlike any other creature, which would become paralyzed from the same sting, the Grasshopper Mouse has a unique cell make-up which rejects the toxins and blocks the sensory pain signals, even with increasing levels of toxicity, so it carries on as usual – and the scorpion becomes lunch.
I think people who have put their faith in our Savior Jesus Christ are like common house mice who have morphed into becoming like the Grasshopper Mouse.
Sin, condemnation, and fear of death are like the poisonous toxins that bring pain, paralysis and ultimately, agonizing death – no matter how we try to run from it.
Yet, because of the life-giving, powerful infusion of our Savior’s blood, we become transformed (Hebrews 9:12)!
Sin, condemnation, and the fear of death no longer have any hold on us. Instead, we who formerly were like weak prey, guilty and defeated under the weight of our sin, become free (Hebrews 9:15).
We are now able to do incredible things for His glory through His power at work within us (Ephesians 3:20).
We are now more than conquerors, overcoming all manner of struggles, hardships, trials, sufferings, and losses (Romans 8:37), – because His love is now in our DNA and has created a cellular mutation that renders us immune to the sting of death and sin (1 John 1:7).
He gave us an incredible blood transfusion that transformed us!
Where we used to be timid and fearful in the darkness of this world, we can now be bold and courageous, behaving not like the skulking, shrinking victims we once were, but like the royally adopted sons and daughters we have become (Romans 8:15).
Where we used to be quiet, perhaps only uttering quiet squeaks in alarm or fear, we can now “howl” out our praises and worship to our God boldly and with thanksgiving in our hearts (Isaiah 24:14, Psalm 98:4).
Because our Savior loved us so dearly, He has taken the sting and suffering of our sin upon Himself, enduring the agony and death we deserve (Hebrews 2:9-10).
By placing our faith in Him, we gain the reward of a life now lived free from the fear of death, free from the stinging shame of condemnation, free from the poisonous toxicity of sin.
We can now exclaim with a new, joyful ferocity: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55)
The Grasshopper Mouse preaches a powerful sermon simply by being itself in its remarkable existence.
I want to do the same.
Let’s live like a horde of Grasshopper Mice: courageous, fierce, free from fear of death.
Maybe we can encourage other house mice to get the same “blood transfusion”, too.
