Is this season a time of joy or a time
of pain for you? This Christmas will probably be the hardest one of my life to
date. Often, if feels like more than I can physically and emotionally bear.
It's too much for me. I have spent the last month begging Ryan to just let us
leave. To spend Christmas away from here so that I don't have to face it. (And
to be honest, there is still a part of me holding out that maybe tomorrow we
will just pack up and peace out of Houston.) If this time of
year brings you anything BUT joy (and a little "healthy" amount of
stress) and you
just feel like telling someone about it, I would love to chat with you and hear
all about it.
This prayer from church this past
Sunday helped me a lot. Helped me to not feel quite so alone. And even though I
still want nothing more than to run...at least there is hope in Jesus Christ.
"Sometimes we miss the
Christmas season. There’s a lot of joy, a lot of excitement, a lot of
anticipation for the good good things. One thing that we tend to forget, in the
Old Testament between Genesis and Exodus, there were 400 years that passed and
for that time God’s people were in slavery. Between the Old and New Testament,
another 400 years and God’s people were basically in slavery in Rome in their
own land. During those times when they thought of anticipating the coming of
the Messiah, it was for freedom. It was that the suffering would end. So often
at Christmas we know this can be a lonely and sad time for many people. We know
some of those people personally. For many of us, it’s a time that brings great
joy and we should celebrate that. It’s amazing and we are blessed to feel that
way. For others, the coming of the Messiah means that there’s hope. There’s
hope that it won’t always be that way. There’s hope that this broken world
we’re in might change…
…Maybe you’re in that time
of joy and everything is as it should be and hallelujah. Hallelujah! But maybe
you or somebody you know might not be feeling that way this Christmas and maybe
we can pray for them. Maybe we can sing these words for them that they would
anticipate the coming of the Messiah because it would be a time for hope. A
time that assures them that it won’t always be this way…
Father we are grateful, so
grateful for the promise of your coming and your coming again. This world is
broken, this world has so many problems but you are good and you have promised
your salvation. You’ve promised deliverance from all the things that are broken
in this world. So Father we love you. We are excited to celebrate your coming.
We pray for those who aren’t feeling the excitement and the love this season.
We pray that you would show it to them in an amazing way."
- Chad Erb
Thank you for this prayer
Chad.
