Dear Rosabelle,
It’s Advent.
We’re waiting for a baby. We’re singing hymns that we always sing this time of year. We’ve decorated with beautiful lights and a tree. We’re telling familiar stories and cooking familiar foods. We’re looking forward in hope, longing for the advent of Emmanuel, God with us.
This year, we’re waiting for you. We are in a season of preparation. If you could see our apartment right now, our credit card statement, our calendar studded with appointments, it would be clear that we’re making room for you. Yesterday morning, your dad and I were drinking coffee, lounging around, talking about how we can’t wait for you to be here. We delight in the signs of your coming, my growing belly and your response when I drink something warm. We’re looking forward in joyful expectation, longing for you to be here with us.
We’re waiting for our baby, and we’re waiting for our King.
In the season of Advent, we look expectantly for the coming of Jesus. We remember the stable, and Mary, and the shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night. We tell about the three wise men and their gifts. We celebrate the baby, his humanity, his dwelling with us. We rejoice that he came to ransom his people, to set them free.
We also look for his return. We know he is coming again, not as a baby, but as a King. He will come again in glory and his kingdom will have no end. He will make all things new and set all things right. Sorrow and pain will be no more, neither sighing, but life everlasting. We are in a season of preparation. Already, and not yet. He has come, and he will come again. We live differently in light of his advent. We live remembering and hoping.
And so we wait. Longingly, expectantly, joyfully. Come, Lord Jesus.
Love,
Me
Great is Thy Faithfulness 