Living Out the Incarnation

I just read an incredibly beautiful post by Sarah Bessey. All of her stuff is beautiful, but this one is especially gorgeous because it's about the incarnation and that's one of my favourite topics, especially in December! It's a post about not sanitizing the Christmas story, and about being real, and about seeing beauty and redemption and love in the middle of the messiest situations. I loved it!

The only part that didn't resonate with me was the giving birth part. Even though I've processed some stuff related to infertility, it still hurts sometimes. This was one of those times. As much as I loved what I was reading, there was still an ache in my heart as I realized I couldn't identify with this part of the Christmas story. And then I reflected on these words of Sarah's, written to articulate why we avoid the messy humanity of the Nativity:

It’s too much pain, too much waiting, too much humanity, too much God, too much work, too much joy, too much love and far too messy. With far too little control. And sometimes it does not go the way we thought it was supposed to go and then we are also left with questions, with deep sadness, with longing.
 

She was talking about childbirth, but it struck me that this is universal. I'm a part of this. Any human being in relationship with another human being knows this - the pain, the messiness, the joy, the love, and the lack of control. As an adoptive mom, I know this. I have waited, uncertain. I have known pain, confronted with the messiness of our children's histories and the grief and loss that will always be a part of their stories. I have questions. Things have not gone the way we assumed they would.

But this is where the incarnation really starts to take on profound meaning for me: I have the opportunity to live it out. As Jesus chose to enter the world and redeem it in all its messiness, so I can choose to enter in to life with my children, and parent in ways that will bring healing and redemption - recognizing always that only God is the true Healer, and I am but the one He has chosen to do this work, with these children. I am humbled and awed as I realize that I get to be a part of this. As I strive to "be with" those I love - to be fully emotionally present - I am participating in the redemptive work of Christ in the world. As I learn to lay aside my expectations and my preferences, and learn to parent in a way that takes my children's histories into account, I am living out a bit of the incarnation. And as I celebrate this Advent season, I am looking forward to the day when the Great Healer will return. As Sally Lloyd-Jones puts it in The Jesus Storybook Bible, the return of Jesus will "make all the sadness and tears and everything seem like just a shadow that is chased away by the morning sun."

Until then, I will celebrate Emmanuel - God with us - all year long. Laying aside, living it out, and longing for His return.

(http://www.thatartistwoman.org/2008/12/how-to-make-nativity-silhouette-art.html)