Well, it’s Christmas Eve here in Thailand, so merry Christmas from the future!
In the spirit of the season, and because I’m away from home for the first Christmas in basically ever, here is a post about life and Jesus and the World Race.
This is also a surreptitiously disguised letter to my pastor. Shhh.
So Ken Shady this may surprise you given my penchant for passing notes and playing Candy Crush during church, but I do listen sometimes. And I was especially listening last year when you stood at the front of the church and preached about the Magi.
Because, you see, I was inspired. I took notes on the bulletin and put them in my Bible. And I brought that bulletin home and used it to make my case for the Race.
The Magi, you told us, were wise men. Why were they wise? Because they listened to God. They payed careful attention to the voice of their creator and understood the signs the Lord sent them because they were looking for them. But even more than that, the wise men were wise because they sought out Jesus. They knew whom they were looking for and they traveled far an wide to find Him. They gave up their comforts and their very lives as they knew them to pursue their Savior. Because that is the wisest decision of all; ultimate desire to encounter the Messiah, and taking the steps necessary to make that a reality.
As I sat there in the pew with the coffee stain from that one time, you know the one my family sits in every Sunday, I made connections in my mind. I also wanted to pursue my Savior. I felt that all the signs the Lord had been giving me had been pointing to the World Race. I though it would be stupid of me to ignore those signs, I wanted to give up my life as I knew it to set off in search of my Messiah. This was the argument I presented to my family to try to convince them to let me travel to three different countries for nine months instead of going back to college. And I guess maybe it worked?
So here I am. Across the world in pursuit of more. In pursuit of my Savior. Searching for an encounter with Jesus Christ, the Messiah.
So here I am, without my family for Christmas. That was part of giving up everything I knew. However, the good news is that the Lord gave me a new family to celebrate Christmas with, a.k.a my team. Which I love. But also, Christmas isn’t really about family. It’s also not about decorations, apparently.
It’s about Jesus. It’s about the birth of a baby who was SO IMPORTANT that three Very Intelligent People decided to pack up life and travel on camels for a couple YEARS to find Him. It’s about a God who was so drastically in love with His creation that He let His one and only son endure human life so He could be the end-all, be-all sacrifice for the sins of the world. It’s about the baby who grew into the man who WILLINGLY endured ridicule and agony and real, true death so He could spend eternity with me. And you. And everyone else on the face of the earth.
I still think the Magi were on to something. I still think that wisdom comes from pursuit of the Lord. I mean, He pursues us every day. Hallelujah.
So maybe if you’re down because your tinsel doesn’t hang straight, or because you’re missing someone special this Christmas season, maybe sit and ponder what you are in pursuit of.
*disclaimer- it’s like, dark-thirty in the morning as I write this, so please forgive any spelling inaccuracies that may arise. I may fix them later. Maybe.
