The thrill of hope in this weary world

Christmas is always one of my favorite times of the year.  Christmas music, Christmas movies, colder weather, Christmas parties, Christmas decorations, Christmas lights, Christmas cookies, Christmas EVERYTHING.  I love it all.  I’m one of those people who would listen to Christmas music all year round if it was socially acceptable or even just acceptable in my house!  I keep a nativity on display in our home all year round.  I LOVE it.

But for as joyful as this season typically is for me, this year there’s definitely an element of weary. Isn’t it there for all of us?  So often the pain of a lost loved one, of distance between families, of fractured relationships, of missed events becomes real and raw during the holiday season. And 2020 has added a whole different level of feelings of loss and confusion and weariness.

Life, and a pandemic, doesn’t stop because Christmas is near.  There’s not a sudden 30 or 45 day reprieve from pain and heartache and fear that the road of life brings because we’re nearing the celebration of the Savior’s birth.  Hearts break, dreams shatter, souls become weary.

But isn’t that what Jesus came for? The weary soul? My favorite Christmas song is O Holy Night.  One night, one birth that changed the world forever.  A Savior born so that you & I could have the hope of eternity.  “The thrill of hope, a weary world rejoices.”  But Jesus didn’t just come for the world and for eternity.  He came for the single soul that is weary from the road of life.  He came to be personal, real and relevant to me.  To you.

He came to bring hope, to anchor us in hope, so that our weary souls can rejoice.  So that in the midst of raw emotion, we can experience the thrill of hope that Christ’s birth allows for us.  Hope that on the other side of eternity, we will be reunited with those we’ve lost.  Hope that a doctor’s prognosis holds no power to God’s healing.  Hope that the most fractured of relationships can be miraculously restored.  Hope that a weary soul can find reason to rejoice.

If this Christmas season is one that finds your soul weary, cling to that thrill of hope that the Savior’s birth brought to this world.  Cling to the hope that He extends to you now.  Let your weary soul rest in Him and find in Him the thrill of hope that causes your weary heart to rejoice.