​I'm here.

Another New Year's Eve.

For much of my life, I have looked out the window of this day into tomorrow with hope, maybe even with some expectancy, that the new year will arrive with all the answers.

The answers to the many spaces where life has not yet lived up to all that I had hoped life would be by now. The answers to all the ways life stays hold of my feet, refusing to let me get ahead.

But I will not look out the window that way this year. I turned 60 back in April, maybe I am finally old enough to know that sort of looking is like looking for an illusion.

Like waiting for the magician to show me his trick.

Maybe I am wise enough to finally know that life really has no answers, only questions. And anything that does resemble answers in life emerge from within us in response to those questions.

Maybe as we peer into each new year looking for answers that never come, we actually miss the questions that show up to escort us to them.

Questions like:

Who are you becoming, and is that who you want to become?

Are you holding onto something that's keeping you from moving forward?

Do your relationships reflect mutual respect, love, and growth?

Are you pursuing what makes you want to get out of bed in the morning, or just what feels comfortable?

Where do you find strength when life feels overwhelming?

How often do you pause and pat yourself on the back for how far you've come?

Where are you placing your ultimate hope, and is that hope sustaining you?

You see, the answers we are looking for in life are often disguised as questions.

Questions we often miss while searching for answers.

Life has never been about producing answers. Life has always been about directing us toward coming up with our own. We can stay awfully stuck, you and me, from new year to new year, while we stand looking out the window waiting on our answers to be ushered in with the fireworks and the hanging of each new calendar.

What question(s) is 2025 waiting to ask you?

Maybe this is the year you will tackle your questions, and in doing so, find the answers you've been waiting for.

That's no easy task. It takes great curiosity and often even greater courage. But there is hope in there, hope much greater than you'll find standing at your window.

Waiting. And waiting...

Here's to you and me tackling some big questions in 2025.

Here's to the answers that will emerge from within us and become part of the great magic trick of life.

Your answers are there waiting for you in 2025.

Don't miss them, I'm forewarning you, they are coming disguised as questions.

Happy New Year's Eve, my friends.

I wasn't old enough to vote when Jimmy Carter was president. I was, however, old enough to hear some of the rumblings about the president. Most of them unfavorable.

In fact, history, or at least the folks who qualify to have some say in the part of history that officially measures the value of presidents, continues to put Carter in the bottom ten of all presidents.

I HAVE been old enough to observe President Carter since his presidency ended, however. And this morning, not 24 hours after the death of President Carter, not 24 hours since God spoke the words upon this man's 100 year life, "well done my good and faithful servant", I am left to wonder, do the rumblings of pundits and the measures of historians really matter much in the end?

I HAVE been old enough to observe President Carter since his presidency ended, however. He has not taken the path of any other post-presidency president that I can recall. Where many leave their presidencies and pursue other political avenues, speaking tours, book deals, business ventures, or maybe lives out of the public eye all together, President Carter went to work building houses for those in need (among many other humanitarian efforts around the world).

President Carter and his wife Rosalyn first volunteered for Habitat for Humanity near their home in Plains, Georgia in 1984. And each year since then, up until 2019, when Carter was well into his 90s, the Carters showed up to work alongside homeowners in communities in the United States and around the world to build and improve houses for the needy.

They didn't show up for photo opportunities. They showed up, often for weeks at at time, with hammers and saws and hard hats.

They showed up to serve, not to be seen.

Carter said about his work with Habitat, “I think every human being has within himself or herself a desire to reach out to others and to share some of our blessings with those who are in need. What’s opened up that avenue for me and my wife and hundreds and thousands of others is Habitat for Humanity. It makes it easy for us to reach out and work side by side with the homeowner who’s never had a decent house, perhaps. I haven’t been on a Habitat project that I wasn’t thrilled and inspired and wept.”

It has been said that in spite of being largely regarded historically as a political failure, Carter had few rivals when it came to his accomplishments as a former president.

I'm not sure he has ANY rivals in that category.

Carter said in a 1991 documentary when asked to talk about his presidency, "The biggest failure we had was a political failure. I never was able to convince the American people that I was a forceful and strong leader."

I find it ironic, really, that politics seems to demand forceful and strong, and yet much of the world is deeply longing for someone to come build them a house.

I wonder, how many who have called Carter's presidency a failure have spent time - any time, not decades of their life - working alongside strangers helping them build their home?

I'm not sure Carter was built for forceful and strong. He was leading church bible studies as a teenager; he refused to ride in the flashy limousine and instead walked at his 1977 inauguration. He had a humility about him that was never going to lend itself to forceful and strong.

But then again, forceful and strong can have a lot of different meanings. I spent many years building houses. It takes a lot of strength and force to haul around two by fours, to hoist beams, to drive a nail into a foundation block.

I wonder this morning. Actually, correct that, I don't wonder at all. I know.

President Jimmy Carter has had conversations by now with God. And I know God has commended President Carter on his century of life well-lived. I know God has held up President Carter's strength and force for those who needed him most as a most humble reflection of a loving God.

I don't believe there has been a single conversation about Democrat or Republican.

I believe maybe God said to President Carter:

“I think every human being has within himself or herself a desire to reach out to others and to share some of our blessings with those who are in need."

I created you with that desire, God might have said to him. Thank you for being one of those who pursued it. Thank you, good and faithful servant.

In a time of what feels like significant political turmoil for many, maybe we take the lead of a strong and forceful leader, maybe we all go help someone build a house next year they'll never have if we don't show up to help them build it.

We all have within us a desire to reach out to others.

Maybe we spend 2025 doing just that.

Friday afternoon, my 18 year-old son wanted to go see the movie Sonic the Hedgehog. I was a bit surprised but surely happy about his eagerness to still see a 'kid' friendly movie.

Saturday morning, the same 18 year-old asked to go see the movie Nosferatu. I hadn't even heard of it. I quickly watched the two minute Nosferatu trailer, then looked at this kid with disbelief and asked, "really?"

How is it possible, I asked him, that the same human that wants to watch an animated movie full of laughter and joy want to go watch all the darkness and blood-letting that comes with vampires?

He gave me the blank stare, non-answer that teens expect their dad to interpret as the answer, but in that look he seemed far less confused by this choice than me.

So at 60 years old yesterday, I watched my first vampire movie.

Walking out of Nosferatu yesterday, I told the boys that I was pretty sure I'd never in my life sat in two more opposite experiences on consecutive days as I just had with those two movies. They do not make movies any more different than these two, I told them. In response, my youngest offered up, "but both writers achieved what they were trying to achieve."

I actually found that to be quite an empathetic thing to say. Ian's ability to look into the hearts and minds of both writers, looking beyond even the final production and audience makeup and response, was encouraging to me.

Our kids are often learning lessons we aren't teaching.

As a dad, I am reminded that yes, there are certain ways I'd like my boys to adapt to my way of seeing the world. It's a natural parental instinct, I think. But I also think there is great value, necessity even, for a parent to adapt to a child's wide ranging curiosity of the world, to give a child's interests permission to defy categorization.

Frankly, I'm not even sure what the Sonic/Nosferatu overlap genre and category could possibly be!!

Reflecting on Elliott's movie choices, I couldn't help but see a blend of innocence and maturity. I couldn't help but see that two simple movie choices were complex indicators that my kid is definitely becoming his own person. And that a lot of that person has interests that aren't mine, a lot of his decisions don't and won't look like mine.

Maybe some parents get scared by that. Scared when their kids have minds of their own.

I don't.

I feel like I've been fighting my whole life to develop a mind of my own. I'm not sure I've ever felt as free to equally embrace Sonic and Nosferatu as freely as I can embrace their differences today. I'm thankful for that freedom.

More than that, I'm thankful that my boys seem to be embracing that freedom long before I got there. Who knows, if they hadn't, I may have gone my whole life without seeing a vampire movie.

I'm still processing how I feel about that reality 🤣🤷‍♂️ - but in the words of my 16 year-old, both writers achieved what they were trying to achieve.

Parenting can be a wild ride, and sometimes it makes perfect sense to just go along for the ride.

​This is that week. That week of tension between saying goodbye to the past year and looking with hope to the new one ahead.

I've always favored the looking ahead side of that tension. Maybe because I've had more years in my life I've been ready to be done with than years I've wanted to hold onto 🤷‍♂️.

In fairness to me, though, I think it's also because I've always been a fairly hopeful person. And there's little more hopeful to me than new beginnings, and maybe nothing offers us a greater chance at new beginnings than a new year.

As I've looked into the new year, the last several years I've reflected on something Nick Saban once said:

Saban said, "The fact of the matter is, if you want to be good, you don't have a lot of choices. It takes what it takes. You have to do what you have to do to be successful."

Many of us go into a new year setting new years resolutions. Most us know exactly what it takes to achieve those resolutions. So, if come February or March we are no longer on a path to achieving them, it's not because we forgot the path, it's because we allowed ourselves to believe that there are alternative paths.

We allowed ourselves to believe we could make choices other than the choices it takes.

The older I get, the more I'm coming to believe having choices is overrated. Maybe even destructive. Too often choices become distractions and not opportunities.

Because deep down I believe we all know the choices that are best for us in any given moment or season. Most of us know what it takes. It's the choices outside of what it takes that invite us in to thinking otherwise.

I encourage you to do what I'll be doing the next couple of days. I'm going to be writing down the two or three things I want to be good at next year. Things I want to change or overcome. Then I'll write down the two or three specific things I'll have to do each day or week to be successful.

I'm going to write down my personal it takes what it takes list....

Maybe you want to be good at running. Or nutrition. Or going to the gym.

Maybe you want to be good at writing. Or relationships. Or parenting. Or your faith.

Maybe you want to be good at sending thank you cards or reading books or making the world cup soccer team.

I don't know what's important in your life. I don't know what dreams you've dreamed for a dozen New Years only to see them not come true. I don't know what, come December 31, 2025, will leave you feeling like this is a year you want to hold onto.

But I know what it takes to get you there. It takes limiting your choices to doing what it takes.

Write it down, like you have discovered an old family recipe. And cook it every day, like it's an old family recipe passed down for generations. This is not the year to experiment with the ingredients. To mess with a family tradition. It doesn't need a sprinkle of this or a dash of that.

It needs what it needs. And nothing else.

Make this the year of no other choices.

None other than doing what it takes.

​I was sitting in the parking lot of Barnes and Noble earlier this week. I was talking on the phone with a friend. I told her about a gift idea I had for my boys. I told her I was going to buy us all the same book, then I was going to put a note in my boys' books offering them cash to read it, write about it, and have a conversation with me about what the book meant to them.

She said, "that's a great idea. I might steal it."

(It's a blessing to have confidence building friends in your life who will tell you that they are going to steal your ideas).

I also told her that if I'm being honest, this gift is for me and not for them. Having meaningful conversations has never been my strong suit, even if I am better at it than I've even been. I also know there are some hallow voids in my life from never having had and being unable to have meaningful conversations with people in my life I wish I could have.

And maybe at times feel like I should have been able to.

I don't want my boys to have those voids. I don't want to deepen the holes of my own voids by passing them down to them. And it just seemed easier to me, and yes, maybe just easier FOR me, to say I'll pay you guys a couple of hundred bucks to read, write about and talk about this book with me than it would have been talking about voids.

I admit, it had a bit of a bribery feel to it, even if I felt completely okay with that while believing the ends would justify the means. But all feels of bribery disappeared when the boys opened their books and read their notes and smiled.

Not just smiled. I have seen their smiles when they get their hands on cold hard cash. These were not those smiles. These were smiles that said they were looking forward to this project together far more than they were looking forward to the cash. (Even if I have no illusions that when we are done they are going to say keep your money, dad....).

I think all boys have an inner longing to be able to read with their dad, write with their dad, have meaningful conversations with their dad. I think it's there long before a boy turns 50 and discovers he missed out on it.

These were not smiles of granting a dad his wish, these were smiles of boys having THEIR wishes granted.

I don't know if this was a great idea - one worth stealing. But I know for sure it came from my commitment to relentlessly tackle some of the deepest holes in my life, even if most of the time I have no idea how to tackle them.

Sometimes I'm sitting in the parking lot of a book store and an idea comes to me about how to tackle them. There were days when my tackling ideas would scare me off. Those days are gone.

As we head into the new year, it might be worth the time to think about things you've been wanting to tackle. Maybe consider trying something that feels way out there and yet, someone way out there in your life might be waiting for you to try it.

Sometimes relentlessly tackling our wishes ends up being the granting of someone else's.

Sometimes bribery isn't bribery at all.

​And just like that, Christmas is over.

That's how it can feel today. After all the shopping and gift exchanges and cookie swaps and cooking and cleaning, today can feel like a big yuletide hangover.

It can feel like Christmas is over.

But for Jesus, the one for whom this all took place, for him, today is the day we officially get the party started. Because for Jesus, the Christmas party is never about celebration to begin with, it is about transformation.

Baby Jesus didn't come to the manger to be celebrated, he came to be a change agent. And change rarely shows up in the stable where the party takes place; it shows up where people take it once they leave the stable behind.

It's kind of like church. What's the point of showing up to sing WITH one another on Sunday if we're going to be screaming AT one another on Monday?

The baby in a manger, the Christmas story, is the delivering of the gifts of kindness, compassion, forgiveness, and love towards others. But if we're too exhausted from giving our worldly gifts to one another, who is left to deliver these gifts that Jesus gave to us?

If we are all drained in the Christmas after party, who is left to carry on the good tidings of great joy the angels announced were awaiting us in the stable?

Jesus didn't show up to invite us into Christmas. Jesus showed up to invite us to take Christmas into the world.

This morning is a great morning to ask, not what did I get for Christmas, but what is different about who I am BECAUSE OF Christmas. Today is a great day to ask, did Christmas leave me better at making the world a better place for all? Because that's what Jesus came to make us better at, not throwing lavish Christmas parties.

I'm not here trying to throw coal on anyone's Christmas season or Christmas parties. If we've all been through this Christmas season and we're all feeling like today is the perfect day to start delivering those good tidings of joy to the world, well then every Christmas party has been well worth the party.

But if we're not feeling that way, if we don't have enough left in the tank for that, it's possible we went to the wrong party. Or at least forgot what we were there to celebrate.

We have our gifts now. Jesus brought them. Kindness and compassion and forgiveness and love for all others. Jesus has challenged us to load up our sleighs and start delivering today.

Maybe Jesus does believe in Santa?

For Christmas is not over, at least not in Jesus' eyes.

In his eyes, Christmas has only just begun.

​The tears flow this morning.

This arrival in Bethlehem, with so many emotions.

I have never paid more attention to the meaning of Christmas as I have this Christmas.

I have never needed it, the meaning of Christmas, as much as I have needed it this Christmas.

And as such, in many ways, I literally wake up feeling as if I am in Bethlehem this morning. I am a wise man. A shepherd. Joseph. Overwhelmed by the beauty of this Christ child.

I have no words that can capture my heart for Bethlehem this year more than the words offered to us by Matthew West through his song, Because of Bethlehem.

*****

Just a tiny nowhere town
With a tiny no-room inn
This is where the greatest story ever told begins
Where just a tiny beating heart
Had all creation leaning in
That night the world forever changed
Because of Bethlehem

It's where a star led to a stable
A baby's cry made angels sing
And the search to find a savior
Led to Heaven's humble King
Where the wise men found thе answer
The shephеrds found the Lamb
And I found my Immanuel
Because of Bethlehem

Love is born
Hope is here
Heaven's light has made the darkness disappear
Peace on earth
Good will to men
God with us
All because of Bethlehem

From a child in a cradle
To a king upon a cross
He knew the road was leading Him
To pay a crimson cost
And when no other arms could carry
The weight of all our sin
He took the fall and it happened all
Because of Bethlehem

From a tomb that love left empty
To a Father's right hand throne
And a promise He's preparing us
A place we'll soon call home
He who came to earth from heaven
Is coming back again
And our eyes will see eternity
Because of Bethlehem

Love is born
Hope is here
Heaven's light has made the darkness disappear
Peace on earth
Good will to men
God with us
All because of Bethlehem

*****

I, Keith, am forever loved because of Bethlehem.

I am forever complete brokenness made whole because of Bethlehem.

I am forever treasured and seen and admired for who I am, the real me, because of Bethlehem.

Heaven's light has made forever the darkness in me disappear - because of Bethlehem.

May all of you, my dear and precious friends, find light in your darkness. And in moments when if indeed it feels like there is no light to be found, I encourage you, go to Bethlehem.

Bethlehem is open well before and well after Christmas.

It waits for you with open arms.

God with us, ALL of us, all because of Bethlehem.

Merry Christmas dear friends.

​Christmas.

For Christians it creates an amazing and yet at times challenging parallel.

This December we have been walking toward Bethlehem, and yet, at the same time, waiting on Jesus. But then, after Bethlehem, we will be returned to walking, walking toward tomorrow, and yet, at the same time, waiting on Jesus.

Why would God do that, come to us to answer our waiting, only to leave and return us to waiting once again?

I certainly won't complain about that plan. I wasn't around the first time so I'm grateful to have not missed out on this chance to experience the second and final appearance.

I think in some way it boils down to this:

Jesus came the first time for those who had been waiting to say, I have come for you. And then when he left, he left with a very important question for the people then and the people now and all the people to come. He left asking, I have come for you, now the question is, will you come for me?

The first appearance was God's way of fully proving to us, I am pursuing you. So much so that I will die on a cross as a final demonstration of my pursuit. And now somewhere God watches and wonders of each of us, what will you do in the waiting to demonstrate your pursuit of me?

We walk toward Bethlehem today, the final steps, actively pursuing the baby in a manger. Fully trusting we will find the baby there.

But then we will return to waiting. What will the pursuit look like then? Because finding Bethlehem has never been about the waiting is over, it's always been about the waiting has really just begun. Finding Bethlehem has always been about Jesus finding us, and then challenging us to forever find him.

Forever waiting well for Jesus to come again to forever end the waiting.

What does waiting well look like?

For me personally, it looks like deepening my relationship with God every day. And honestly, that looks simply like me recognizing God's presence in my life as often as I can throughout the day. Sometimes that looks like a prayer. Sometimes it looks like me saying thank you for the mountains. Sometimes it sounds like me awkwardly and awfully singing along to a song.

It looks like me trying to be a light in the world. Jesus said whatever we do for the least of these, that we do for him. I have to imagine doing for others helps Jesus feel pursued. It has to make Jesus feel like I am waiting well.

It looks like me using the gifts God has given me. Writing this advent series has been my way of saying, you pursued me God through the giving of this gift of writing to me, I will now pursue you back with this gift. I will write my way to waiting well.

It looks like seeking peace in the world.

It looks like surrendering to God, releasing the need to plan every detail of my life in order to make room for God to write his details on my life while I am waiting. (Maybe the most difficult part of this waiting if I'm being real).

Waiting well for Christmas is a beautiful kind of waiting. Oh, how we long for that baby in a manger.

But then that baby arrives and then leaves us on a mission. He left us a challenge, that in the waiting for him to come again we would actively live lives that look like that baby never left.

"Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake" (Luke 12:37).

Tonight in our waiting, we sleep well, for the baby Jesus is coming.

But then tomorrow the journey becomes all about being awake.

Being awake, and waiting well.

​Most people have never heard of my favorite band.

Downhere

Technically, they are no longer a band. But once a band enters your heart, they can break up with themselves but they can never break up with you.

Downhere came into my life pretty near the same time I let God back into my life, back in the early 2000s. And really, quite unknown to the band, they sang me through a bit of a spiritual revival. And probably no song of theirs served that role more than their 2009 Christmas song, How Many Kings?

I will never forget hearing these words for the first time, words that land as powerfully today as they did back then. Not just words, but a series of very important questions to the listener.

To me.

How many kings stepped down from their thrones?
How many lords have abandoned their homes?
How many greats have become the least for me?
And how many Gods have poured out their hearts
To romance a world that is torn all apart?
How many Fathers gave up their Sons for me?

Even writing those words for you now, as I can hear the band in the background of my mind singing them, the words long to move me to tears.

Why?

The why is often different each time I listen, I suppose.

I have sons. So sometimes I ask myself, for whom in this world would I sit idly by and watch either of my sons crucified at the hands of religious extremists as a show of my love? Because Christmas can never forget that as God proudly watched Mary and Joseph hold his only begotten baby, God knew the day of the cross was coming as well.

Coming for us.

And then there is this reality that twice in the last several years I have gone to Honduras to serve with a non-profit. When you spend time in a place like Honduras, a place largely lacking almost all of the things I would consider comforts back home, you get a small glimpse into what it means for a king to voluntarily leave his throne to serve others.

But it is God's economy. It is God's desire. That we would always aim to be less in the grand scheme of things. That our greatest show of love comes from a longing to elevate others at the expense of ourselves.

I want to say that again.

In God's world, our greatest show of love flows from a heart that longs to elevate others at the expense of ourselves.

That is God's idea of romancing a broken world. A willingness - a desire even - to be broken FOR the broken.

So back to the tears.

Why?

Because so often that is not me. So often my desire is not to become less. It is not to become broken for the broken. It is not to step down from or stray to far away from my privileged throne and all that goes with it.

But in Christmas, God has made it quite painfully clear that IS the answer. That in a world torn all apart, the only answer to togetherness that will ever work is growing hearts that are more sacrificial than ambitious, more giving than receiving, more abandoning than pursuing.

When we ask God, just exactly how much do you want us to sacrifice in the name of this love of yours God, we are asking a God who gave up his home and his throne and his only son as a way of saying "I love you" to us.

When we ask God this, and when we sing this song, How Many Kings, it can be quite hard, at least for me, because my instincts and too often my answers don't line up with the answers God has given us through Christmas.

The good news, the encouragement of Christmas, is God doesn't expect us to be perfect. God does not expect us to be God. God is most interested in the direction of our hearts and not the perfection of them.

So on the way to Bethlehem, as you sing my favorite song in the world, maybe reflect on your direction.

Is my love pointed more to me or more to them? Is my heart aligned more with giving or receiving? Am I caught up in all that I can pursue or am I working to abandon some of the comforts in my life in the name of comforts for others?

Christmas didn't come to make us perfect, but it did come inviting us to change some directions.

I am forever grateful that the band Downhere came along at a time in my life when I was changing some directions. And that every time I hear their music, and especially this song, I'm invited to keep changing them.

​When the Messiah came, the Israelites had been waiting for centuries for his arrival. Their waiting was filled with longing and uncertainty and at times, doubt.

All they had to lean on was God's promises spoken through the prophets over the years:

Micah 5:2: The Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.
Isaiah 7:14: He would be born of a virgin.
Numbers 24:17: A star would announce His coming.
Genesis 49:10: He would come from the tribe of Judah.

Maybe that is the hardest part of our relationship with God. We are often a people of "right now" and our God is often a God of "wait until later."

I honestly have no idea why God is so into making us wait. I don't. I mean, I have so many perfect "right now" answers if God would only adopt them and deliver them.

But no.

My God is into wait.

Just wait, Keith.

I suppose it can be a mistake, though. To assume that in the waiting nothing is happening. To assume that in the waiting God isn't using our time of waiting to create his perfect timing.

I often say, I can explain away a lot of things in my life as possibly NOT God. The one I can NEVER explain away, though, is perfect timing. A supernatural weaving together of moments and experiences and longings in just the right way and at just the right moment that makes sense of waiting in a way no natural power could do.

You know, the Messiah came at just the right time if the mission of the baby in the manger was going to be to spread God's message of peace and hope and love.

Roads and a common language had developed. Many cultures were dissatisfied with existing religions, creating openness to the gospel. And most people by this time were well versed in the aforementioned old testament prophesies, so they would be more likely than ever to know this baby as the Messiah.

The Israelites had been waiting all that time; and God had been using all that time to create his supernatural perfect timing.

I do work today in my professional life that is as fulfilling as any work I have ever done. Work I can not imagine not doing. It's work that weaves together my life experiences with trauma and addiction and broken relationships.

I waited my whole life to feel this kind of perfect fulfillment in my work; and God was busy putting together the experiences of my whole life to create his supernatural perfect timing.

In addition, writing has become a critical and fulfilling part of my life. My day is not complete if I can't do it. In many ways, I have waited all my life to be a writer; and all my life God was weaving together the stories of my life and weaving writing instruction into my life so that that writing would show up as a demonstration of His supernatural perfect timing.

There are things I still wait on now, long for. There are moments in my life, still, when I find myself asking, how long, oh Lord? And I have heard God respond, as clearly and with as much assurance as I have ever heard God's voice, "something beautiful is on the way."

Christmas helps me believe this. Christmas, the greatest promise ever delivered outside of the promise that in three days that baby would rise again.

Maybe on your way to Bethlehem, you too are waiting. Yes, you agree, Christmas is important, but maybe you find yourself totally distracted by the things in your life you are waiting for, promises that feel undelivered.

I encourage you to bring yourself back to Christmas, and maybe don't see it as that baby in a manger, but see it as a God who does not believe in wasted time. A God who always, with supernatural power, turns what felt like the longest wait ever into the most perfectly timed delivery ever.

Something beautiful is on the way to you.

Yes, Christmas. But also yes, things that right now feel like waiting in your life. Things that feel like undelivered promises.

Feel peace in your waiting, for our God is a deliverer. Little reminds us of that more than Christmas.