Christmas Eve

I'll have to admit that today has been one of the most difficult days that we have had here in Ukraine. It's Christmas Eve, and I expect that tomorrow won't be a whole lot easier.  There are no twinkling lights on a Christmas tree in the corner.  No presents.  No Silent Night.  It's not even Christmas Eve here! (They don't celebrate until January 7.)  No turkey or ham or green bean casserole.

But, I can tell you, without a doubt, this is the most meaningful Christmas I've ever had.  This is the Christmas that I've come the closest to understanding how hard it must have been for the Father to send His Son to a wretched place to save a bunch of no-accounts like us!  This is the Christmas when I realize how much we've been saved from.  This is the Christmas when it's not about the presents, or the tree, or the sweet potato casserole, or what everyone should wear for the Christmas Eve pictures.  This time -- it's just about Him.

I so wish I could be home right now.  But more than that, I want to win this battle of faith.  It's a scary thing we are doing -- no doubt about it.  Bringing a child into our home and family with whom we can't easily communicate, a child that is emotionally damaged and frail, a child that doesn't seem to care for much except what we've brought her -- well, we sometimes get a little scared.

But, wait -- isn't that really what Christmas is about?  Aren't we all that child?  Aren't we all emotionally frail and damaged?  Selfish?  Spiritually inept?  And yet, the Father saw such value in us, that He sent His own Son in the form of a little baby to grow up just so that He could adopt us!  And it wasn't such a simple process and tidy fee -- it was a bloody mess on our suffering Lord that saved us from our own orphan bondage.  We are orphans no more!  We are FAMILY!

And so, when we see Christmas from that perspective . . . and when we see ourselves in Sasha . . . well, we just know that God's grace will ALWAYS be enough.