Touch The Sky

Finding Exceeding Joy 

Finding true joy at Christmas is difficult when you have been dealt a devastating blow, just weeks before and you’re outside of the traditions that normally happen. 

Besides the fact that my sweet angel baby is in heaven with Jesus, celebrating HIS birth firsthand, my oldest daughter and her family are miles away. It’s lonely. 

By now in years past the girls and I would have baked and decorated Christmas cookies, an event that always brought such happiness.  Spending time with my daughters, laughing, baking and using the few tubes of colored icing that I could find by the time I remembered to buy it, lots of sprinkles and Christmas colored balls splashed on top. Don’t be impressed because we rolled out Pillsbury dough and used cutters to create them. After a few rounds of decorating we surrendered to sprinkling them all. I’d package them up and we’d deliver them to the neighbors. My intent was to have a good time but also teach the importance of giving. 

By now we also would have all piled in whatever vehicle we could all fit in and drive around looking at Christmas lights.  We have a family scoring system that contributes to a night full of laughter and fun.  A stop at Starbucks halfway through for warm drinks, even when Texas didn’t cooperate and it was 70 degrees outside.  Everytime a friend would join us on our light adventure their reaction to our system and finally joining in added to the fun.  

We decorate the trees together.  The larger decorative tree for the living area and the smaller family tree tucked in somewhere. It’s where I display the 33 years of ornaments I’ve purchased for my daughters, a new ornament every year.  The ornaments are connected to that year of their life or our family, there is one from Hawaii I got during our family vacation, a Bob the Tomato and Larry Cucumber from their days of loving Veggietales, a car, graduation hats, a cruise ship, and now there are ornaments with their children that are emerging on the tree, Zyla, my sunshine, Aliyah, my valentine, it’s her first Christmas and her ornament is a heart because she was born on Valentine’s day and yes a beautiful ornament of Tatum Sky adorned in gold that lights up. Every year when we decorate the tree we look at the ornaments and think about the years past.  It’s always one of my favorite times each year.  It’s a glimpse of the journey we’ve been on and how God has blessed us.  In the first years, I’d find the cheapest ornaments available because it’s all we could afford as the blessings increased, the ornaments did too.  A display of God’s grace in our lives.  The tree isn’t beautiful from an aesthetically pleasing eye but it’s beautiful because it brings a deeper meaning, the joy of family, the blessings of God. 

We aren’t celebrating Christmas as we know it this year.  We’re all working to get past the holiday as quickly as we can, recognizing the difficult balance of celebrating for the grandchildren here but honoring Tatum’s life and being sensitive to the grief we’re all still walking through.  

Every year I hear someone say, the holidays are a joyous time of year but let’s remember those it’s hard for.  I have said those words. I never thought they would one day apply to me.  How does one move through Christmas, with decorations everywhere. Navigating through what’s supposed to be the happiest time of year, with tears in your eyes, and a hole in your heart

With intentional defiant hope.  

Defiant hope doesn’t just happen naturally, it requires work.  Intentionally deciding that I will grab onto every promise God has given me in the midst of not understanding the low season He’s allowed me to be in.  

Faith without work isn’t faith at all.  James 2:17, “So too, faith, if it does not have works (to back it up), is by itself dead (inoperative and ineffective).  AMP

Tearfully driving to deliver chili and cornbread to my daughter this week, saddened because my home isn’t a safe place for her right now, saddened because I wanted to bake cookies and see Christmas lights, I passed rows of decorated houses and it made me sadder. Missing Tatum, missing my daughters, upset that I didn’t have lights up outside my house to drive up to, upset that I only had my small family Christmas tree up and although putting it up and basking in the memories made me happy at that moment I was now sad because no one was coming to see it.  10 stockings hung on the mantel, one for Jesus, for what?  No gifts would be placed in them, serving no purpose but work for me to put away in January.  

I was sinking into a pit of self pity quickly. 

So after I delivered the chili, while driving home I opened Spotify and found a random Christmas station playing,  “Where are you Christmas” playing. Coincidence? Maybe. But it’s a song that I like, this time the words began to scream at me, a song I had only connected to Cindy Lou Who in the Grinch up until now and never connected the words before. They meant something, and I believe God knew it would gently nudge me to defiant hope. He speaks to us in unexpected ways if we’ll just listen.   

“If there is love in your heart and your mind, you will feel like Christmas all the time”…..it spoke to me. 

I know it’s not a Christian song but God can speak through whatever means is necessary.  Remember He spoke through a donkey once to get a man’s attention.  

I impromptu decided to go look at Christmas lights, first tears flooding my face, with the rain outside, made it hard to drive, but as I drove and saw house after house with lights, the flood became a trickle, the trickle become a few drops and then I could look without tears.  I chuckled at a few houses and thought about what my family would be saying if they were with me.  I kept driving… looking for… something, I wasn’t sure what.   

New words were now playing… “Alleluia, For the Lord God almighty reigns”.  Agnus Dei, turned into “Worthy is the Lamb, Jesus” …  and at the moment a light shined on a garage door, a nativity scene, it’s not something I would normally think is pretty but at that moment it brought a glimmer of joy …. A glimpse into what the season is about.  HOPE.  And then a couple houses down another one, this one a little more elaborate …. “Jesus, we cry holy holy holy” .… I kept driving and around the corner the most beautiful nativity with Jesus lit up in the middle and I stopped and I sat quietly,  in the background “Away in a manger, no room for a bed, the little Lord Jesus” …. 

Coincidence? Maybe.  But I truly don’t believe that.  I believe the footsteps of a righteous man are directed by the Lord. Each and everyone if we’ll let Him be our guide.  In that moment I found something.  

Exceeding great joy … it’s a joy that can’t be explained.  A joy that comes only by finding the true meaning of Christmas.  Jesus. 

My life isn’t a Hallmark movie, I didn’t walk back into my house with cheerful joyful music playing, running to my husband with a cheesy hug and kiss. 

I walked in and my husband was tucked away in his man cave, with the door closed. The house was dark except for my little Christmas tree, and it still felt lonely .… sad.  But one thing had changed, me. 

I on purpose put work to my faith, defiantly fighting hopelessness, sadness, self-pity, anger and confusion and I found exceedingly great JOY that remained in my heart even though my surroundings hadn’t changed. 

And by the way, the next night my husband and I on purpose got a peppermint shake and went to look at Christmas lights, in honor of Tatum. We felt like she’d want us to enjoy the season after all she’s celebrating with Jesus. If she still was here we would have taken her, so we went on purpose, we still missed her, we still missed the family, but we on purpose went and we on purpose found a house that we thought Tatum would like.  Defiantly pressing passed sadness. 

I couldn’t figure out how to end this post, so this morning, it’s Sunday.  I came back to read what I had written the other night and to see if this was the story I wanted to post.  I opened the computer and then realized it was time for my online church.

I stopped and listened to the message.  Rooted in Christmas but shared in a different way, just for me, a whisper from God, “I see you”.  He addressed difficult situations and being at a place you never thought you would be.  His words took me back to the three nativity scenes that had planted the seeds of joy in my heart as I drove by. 

He shared the finishing words that I was looking for.  Coincidence?  Maybe.  But I believe it was God wrapping up the story. 

God brings people, and messages into your messy manger (into your ashes) to help you out. The star the wisemen followed led them to Jesus, and His star is still leading us today, directing our footsteps through seasons that we don’t understand.  Every step we take HE is there, even in a dark car, all alone with tears streaming, HE guided me to what I needed, what I was looking for.

HE always responds to people who search for Him. Follow the STAR!

Merry CHRISTmas!