It is raining today, cold, gray and rainy. Not very merry weather, especially when you have a few last minute errands with four small children in tow! There is one and a half days left until Christmas! So, as we jetted down to The OC (to pick up my diaper bag I left at Jennifer's house on Monday) and back to Fresh Market (to get gravy because we are true Arkansans now and always fry our turkey & there is no gravy with that... oh let's be honest, I CANNOT make gravy in my best dreams... but I am getting way off topic here... sorry), the little ones and I were rocking out to Christmas music, trying to not get bogged down in the soppy weather.

My children are just about beside themselves with excitement right now. Since there are no family members local, gifts have been arriving for a couple of weeks now. They are wrapped up and under the tree, enticing them to stand in the living room, around the tree - speculating as to what could be in them. We have spent quite a bit of time explaining the difference between Christmas TIME and Christmas DAY.

Advent has been a time of excitement and anticipation for us. But I do not live in a delusional world that my 5, 4, 2 1/2 and 9 month old will really get the true depth of how important the birth of Christ is to all of mankind. I do, however, really want them to experience the excitement of anticipating something and then the joy of seeing that promise come to fruition.

As I was driving today, I realized that this is the first Christmas I have really experienced that myself in the eight years since my father died unexpectedly on Christmas morning. Tears come to my eyes even as I type this, but that is not what this blog is about. I have been reading a Christmas devotional that expands on what the people involved in the Christmas Story must have been experiencing and this has really opened up my eyes to some things.

Just as we wait and prepare for Christmas day, so were the Jews of old. The prophets of the Old Testament had promised a savior, The Messiah. He would come and bring peace, he would release the yoke of oppression, he would rescue them. The Israelites waited millenniums for Him. Imagine the anticipation and excitement that they must have felt, wondering when that important gift would come. I love the idea that the Advent season can give us just a tiny taste of that season of waiting & wondering. Of course, we know when and how it turns out but watching it through my children's eyes has really given me a new perspective, this short month somehow mimics what the Israelites experienced so long ago...

Christmas time comes upon us with a bang in our house the weekend after Thanksgiving. We play carols, buy our tree and decorate it along with every other surface in our house. Right off the bat, our little ones know that day when the wonderful presents will be here is just around the corner. I imagine the Isrealites were pretty excited when the prophecies for the Messiah were first made known. A Savior for all mankind would come and make things right. The anticipation must have been thick in the air.

But it is not even December yet, so the excitement for the coming day is tempered with the realities of daily living. There is still school to complete. Daddy still has to go to work. Chores have to be done. The promise of Christmas is still everywhere. We do crafts, bake and lite Advents candles while reading Scriptures every night. But the day seems a long way off and after a few days, the initial exuberance is morphed into an undercurrent of excited anticipation. I believe it was four hundred years between the last book of the Old Testament and the coming of The Messiah. There was a lot of life to be lived in that interim but I am sure that there was always an undercurrent of anticipation, waiting for God's promise to come to fruition. My children are a lot like this. Beyond our Advent calendar and paper chain, they really have no idea when that magical day will come. They wake up every morning asking if today is the day they get to open their presents. Anticipation builds but being so young, they really have no idea how long they will have to wait!

So here we are, less than two day until we will experience the joy of getting gifts we do not deserve. We have all been naughty but we are getting presents and we are excited. I imagine the people in Mary and Joseph's life who knew the prophecies and understood what was happening were feeling a bit like my children - not really believing that they get to be a part of something so special, not really understanding how it is all coming to fruiting in one glorious moment but knowing that the time is upon us.

So this is where the similarities really end. I am sure there will be no angel choirs singing to my children on Christmas morning, the toys will bring happiness and I am sure we will all have a lot of fun; nothing, however, compared to the joy of looking upon the face of God as He laid in the manger. That is okay though. If each year can give Keith & I the chance to teach them just a little bit more about the true gift of Christmas, then that is all that matters!