Christmas Day. The sun is shining and I’m sitting in my beautiful main-floor, sunlit office. Reflecting on this day, and what it means for me. It means that even though I’m flawed – extremely flawed – God wants to restore me. Jesus was willing to come down here and live among us, as one of us. And not in a “I better not have to come down there!” in an angry parent to a willfully disobedient child sort of way. But rather in a “I can see you’re hurting and struggling. I want so much for you! I will come to you and be with you always, guiding you to the best possible outcome.”
Today is that day. The day we remember that Jesus came. To live in an earthly body at a time in history when there was no indoor plumbing! Only to die a horrible, humiliating death. Just so we could talk to God ourselves. We can tell Him anything. Any unspeakable truth. And He wraps His loving arms around us in a way that only He can. He knows us intimately. One of my favourite hugs from God was the heart-shaped stone He showed me on the beach when I had a life-changing decision to make. Then there was the day of my black-belt test. I was nearly paralyzed with fear, and somewhere inside me I heard “remember Gideon”. So I went and looked up the story of Gideon. And there it was…the assurance that I would successfully pass my black-belt test. Judges 6:14 “go in the strength you have…. Am I not sending you?” Thankfully, God’s strength is made perfect in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9). I finished, and passed, the black belt test.
With each passing year I am more and more grateful to be able to talk to God anytime I want. He is always there. He is never sick, or busy, or distracted, or disinterested. He wants us to succeed! I’m a parent, and I want my kids to succeed. And I’m just an extremely flawed human parent. How much more does God want us, His children, to succeed? How much more capable is He to be with us in sorrow, celebrate in our success and lead us when we need to decide, than we are as a human parent? Since He created us and knows us intimately, I would say He is infinitely more capable.
And now we can converse with Him directly, because He so strongly wants us to succeed, that He came down here. God tells us in Jeremiah 29:11 “for I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.”
With that in mind, I look forward to 2026. It could be the best year ever! So far, anyway. Hope, prosperity, conversations with God. What could possibly be better than that?
