Christmas in Macro

Thursday morning I came into the hospital after a sleepless night of stomach pains. I thought I'd be home again in no time, even drove myself in. But one doctor led to another, and in the end I was in the operating room for my appendix.

It is Sunday and I am still in the hospital, hoping to be released tomorrow. Today is Sunday, the 3rd Sunday of advent.

It is hard to be stuck in the hospital when the day is so lovely and you know everyone is making Christmas preparations.

And yet for several weeks I had this feeling that this year had to be different, that there needed to be a quiet in my life and a refocus on Christmas.

Now as I focus my thoughts on what has been and the unknown of recovery and Christmas I know that God has a reason for keeping my planning smaller this year. I usually bake tons of cookies to share, this year that won't happen. With all of the comforts and even diet of my normal life stripped away I have time to see my world differently.

I feel as if I have been given a new lens through which to see this season. And as I examine where I have been and look at Christmas through my macro lens this is what I see (because in macro  you focus on detail).

Look, there is the baby.
Not just any baby, but a baby intended to save this world. 

Look back a week and you can see his mother preparing, waiting, expecting, longing to meet her child. She would have been huge with child, and heavy. And as she and Joseph headed to Bethlehem should would have been uncomfortable, jostled, perhaps even in pain. 

Turning my lens forward I see that we too are a people longing for peace, joy, calm. We are expecting , we are waiting. Groaning and awaiting the coming of our Savior once again. Yet everyone is distracted, and runs about madly. Turning their thoughts to so many other things- their focus is too broad- their true purpose lost. 

Look again, focus in on the baby. There He is. In all his quiet glory. He came to innocent, weak, small, a child. Why? For you, for me, for eternity. 

If you look ahead and focus your lens on His future you will see the reason He came. It did not end at Christmas, or in the small baby born. But His story lives on in the crucifixion and Resurrection of a King who came to save and redeem His beloved world. 

So where is your focus? Which lens are you using?

Before I was using a wide-view lens and all the rush and bustle and gift buying of Christmas was taking all my attention and focus. But now, as I lie in my bed and think and ponder I see that this season, this Christmas, this year, this day and each opportunity I am given I will seek to direct our thoughts and my thoughts and my children's thoughts to Jesus.

Yes, we will have gifts. We will have a tree. But lets not get overwhelmed with the bustle, lets take the time close the doors and turn off the technology and marvel over this baby, and meet this King who came to save our broken world.