Standing Before Him

Well, it is that time of year again… The countdown to Christmas is in single digits, the days are short and dark, the lights are bright, the world is huddling indoors, and it’s time for me to say farewell until 2021. I like to take a break from blogging for the last few days of the year in order to rest well and spend as much time with family as possible – and so that is what I am doing. 😀

But before I do so, I want to leave you with a little something that I feel is especially important this year. This year has been hard. It’s been unexpected and tiring and stressful and angering. This Christmas season is traditionally supposed to remind us of hope – the ultimate hope in the form of a baby who fulfilled promises and lived to promise life to us. And this year more than ever, how we need to cling to that hope. The hope that all will not be dark forever, that there will be justice, that our aching hearts will be healed one day. What a glorious day that day will be! We will stand before our Creator, and we who have clung to hope for so long will finally see it fulfilled in the outstretched arms of our Saviour.

This little piece that I am about to share with you imagines what that moment will be like…

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It was as if all the oxygen in the room was suddenly sucked out, leaving us silenced and gasping.

It was as if the electric shock of his presence left us paralyzed in a strange mingling of wonder and fear.

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The sudden urge to kneel shouldn’t’ve surprised us – the way our knees folded, our hands trembling as our hearts gave one great leap in unison.

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Was that the sound of music? The sound of faintly blowing trumpets and choirs of voices soaring like skylarks in the summer sky?

No, perhaps after all it was just the song of our souls staring into the eyes of the One who formed us –

just the cry of a thousand hearts united in his gaze,

the murmur of realization that here was where we were meant to be all along.

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No wonder we forgot to breathe…

No wonder our hearts skipped a beat…

No wonder…

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Because in that moment, standing under the warmth of this smile

the realization hit us in a lightening flash of awe –

his wounded, blazing hands were outstretched in lavish welcome

to us.

And finally, we were home.

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May this Christmas season be one shot through with the light of hope and a remembrance of the reality that we are made for another world. One day we will be home, with the one we were made for. Until then, let us press on with our eyes and hearts fixed on the joy set before us.

Merry Christmas, my friends. ❤