Making room

What a beautiful day to celebrate. Though I fail time and again at my attempts to be consistent at mostly everything, it is in the getting up and trying again that I continue to learn and grow. We have tried to implement a few traditions during advent, one of them being the Jesse Tree devotionals . We read the devotions and the kids put a new ornament on the tree each morning at breakfast and then we count down the days using the advent wreath made by Ann Voskamp's son, Caleb. The other tradition we've been slowly getting into is a Christmas book to unwrap each night (takes awhile to collect 25!) We had some help this year at our Christmas book exchange party with friends and one of the books that really spoke to me was called "Room for a little One". Of course it is just a children's book about animals needing somewhere to stay and they find a welcoming spot in a particular barn that eventually welcomes Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. It caused me to pause for a moment and ask how often I don't think there is room in my life for the Savior of the World. How I claim busyness, exhaustion, and my agenda as the excuse for not taking dinner to that family with a baby in the hospital or not calling back the woman I know needs a listening ear. Will I make room? Will I choose to love others more? Not because I want to or feel like it but only because that is what He has asked, that is what He does. In the end it will not matter how many to-do lists are lying in a pile on my desk all checked off but what will matter is how loved showed up. The times I chose not to just keep this light to myself as if lighting a lamp and putting it under a bowl but instead walked faithfully out of my comfortable world with the only thing that has the power to make the darkness recede. Jesus Christ, Oh great Light of the World, we celebrate the day you chose to humbly become one of us. May we always make a little more room for more of you.

End of an Era

I thought I was doing well.
Holding myself together in a sense.
Because if you don't want to look like a blubbering fool this is what you do.
Then he knelt down to hug my daughter and all of that was lost.
This man who has been a part of my life for well over a decade.
Every Christmas, every beach vacation, every Thursday night, and certainly every handy man project.
My husband's brother who became closer than my very own.
Of course there are promises of keeping in touch and thoughts of how easy it will be with all of the new technology but it will never be the same.
There is no replacing the physical presence of someone.
Nor will there be any forgetting of how well he loved us and our children.
It's real and raw this gaping hole but slowly and surely I will unclench my fists and let him go,
choosing to be grateful for the time we were given to walk alongside each other.