Joyeux Noël!

In a week that was a flurry of activity to get ready for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and traveling to see family, I had a few really low hours on Tuesday. First, my dermatologist, at my annual checkup, decided that a small place on my forehead needed to be biopsied. Since I have had one small basal cell spot removed 8 or 9 years ago, it was worrisome for me. Then I discovered that I had lost one earring from my favorite pair; they were a gift from Jeff. These two bumps in the road were enough to knock me off-balance.

In fact, I was headed for a full-on pity party, so I took the dog out for a long walk. The cool night air was soothing to my spirit. After we got back in, I really dived into the second half of a great book by Joan Chittister, Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope. This helped me gain some perspective.

Perspective deepened as I learned that Zachary, Jeff’s great-nephew, has to have surgery on Friday to repair some factures of the bones around the eye resulting from a head collision in soccer; and that Charlie from church had emergency surgery, and would be in the hospital over Christmas.

While I would truly like to find the earring, it is a very small thing. It does not take away my memories, or any love. Its loss does not diminish my hope in that which is beyond all possessions—the grace and mercy of our God who has chosen to shelter with us, not grasping at divinity, but emptying God’s own Self that we might have life.

So in the name of the One who came to be born among us, the Prince of Peace, I bid you a gift of holy Joy for this day and all days that come after!

Joyeux Noël!

Luke 2:13-14

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace