I Can't Even Imagine

I will never forget watching our children come into this world.  It was an experience like nothing else in life.  Each time, I was deeply changed by the magnificence of the moment.  

I remember standing amazed (or maybe in shock) in the hospital room next to the bed; powerless to contribute, amazed by the strength of my wife, and grateful for the wisdom of the medical staff in the room.  It was humbling, terrifying, and wonderful.  All at once, it seemed like every emotion I knew at the time collided and washed over me…joy, fear, awe, hope.  Something deep inside of me awakened when I saw my children enter the world.  A depth of love that had never surfaced came rushing into my heart, and my capacity to love another human grew exponentially on those three days.  I had dreamed of what it would be like to be a father.  But in those moments, my dream became a reality. 

Three children and 21 years later, I am still overcome with these same emotions on a regular basis.  Through the personal experience of raising a family, I have become intimately acquainted with joy, fear, awe, and hope.  Perhaps you know what I mean.  

Every year, during the advent season, we have an opportunity to “stand in the hospital by the bed” and observe another birth.  The most amazing birth in the history of humanity.  Of course, there was no hospital room and no bed.  There was no doctor or nurse.  Not even a midwife to coach and encourage.  There was a husband and his wife.  Alone in a stable fit for feeding farm animals, not for delivering a baby.  

I can’t imagine what it was like for Joseph.  He was a simple carpenter engaged to be married, with all the normal hopes and dreams of a young man starting his adult life.  In a massive shift of circumstances, his future wife starts hearing angels speak and shortly thereafter comes home pregnant.  How embarrassing for everyone.  How could he have been so trusting and naive?  Was he not good enough for Mary?  Did he not have what it takes to really be a man?  His plans to step away from the engagement quietly show his respect for Mary, but also reveal his confused and deeply broken heart.  

I can’t imagine what it was like for Mary.  Talk about hopes and dreams.  She was living her dream.  Planning a wedding and looking forward to her future as a wife and, hopefully, a mother.  Her fiancé had paid the bride price to her family and was working diligently to prepare a home for their family one day.   Things were just as they were supposed to be.  Until they weren’t anymore.  A terrifying visit from an angel named Gabriel brought news that life as she knew it was about to change dramatically.  She would soon be pregnant with the son of God.  Scripture tells us that she was overpowered by the Holy Spirit and overshadowed by the Most High.  Her family and friends would soon have to decide if they believed her story, or if this promiscuous young woman was lying to them.  This had never happened before; this doesn’t make sense.  A king, the son of God?  Carried and delivered by a teenage, single peasant woman?  Mary’s life was truly about to become a labor of love.  Again, I can’t even imagine.  

In a final shocking twist, Joseph decides to be the man he was created to be and steps up to the plate.  He decides to stay.  Mary humbly accepts the “blessing” of this pregnancy and decides to trust what God has said.  Her ultimate response to God is profound: “I am the Lord’s servant.  May it be to me as you have said.”  Somehow, it was clear enough to them that God was up to something good.  An epic story, much larger than their own, that they would get to be a part of.  And so their new life as a young, growing family began.  It would be filled with joy, fear, awe, and hope.

Mary and Joseph both had parents and grandparents, generations that came before them.    After the miraculous birth of their first-born son, Jesus, they would go on to have more kids of their own, sending their family legacy out to generations after them whom they would never know.  The Bible is a story of generations.  Families living on the earth, being fruitful and multiplying, and caring for their own.  Families learning to live together, struggling with sin and brokenness, and choosing to have faith in God…or not.  

Every year, the Christmas season is a time when normal life stops for a moment and families get together.  For most of us, it is a time when we get to engage the generations still around in our families.  I encourage you to pay attention over the next few weeks to the people God has placed in your family.  Your spouse, your sons, your daughters.  Your parents and grandparents.  Aunts, uncles, and cousins.  Time is short and this world wants to keep us too busy to truly engage.  The holiday season may bring up old wounds, and can often create new ones.  But it also offers us an undeniable opportunity to be fully present to those relationships.  To listen and to engage.  Put down your phones and computers and catch up with those that God places in your home for the next few weeks.  Jesus came to love people.  Not to get stuff done.  

And I encourage you to “stand in the hospital by the bed”.  Take advantage of this slower season and ask Jesus to meet you in a fresh way this Christmas.  He came to earth as a man to break the power of generational sin and brokenness.  He came to rescue us and set us on a new path of generational blessing.

Thank you Jesus for the amazing gift of your presence with us.  Thank you for coming to earth as Emmanuel (God with us) and for the hope we have in your promise to come again.  We groan and ache and long for your return.  But until that day, give us joy in the midst of sorrow, peace in the midst of chaos, and hope in the midst of fear.  

Merry Christmas to you and your family,

Ed Sweeny
Director, 3GEN Ministries