When I was a little girl in Panama, December 23rd used to be a day of great rejoicing. It was a day that marked the reality of Christmas. It was when I knew Christmas was really here. And for a child, well, you know, Christmas is, like the movie says, the event which the "entire kid-year revolves around!"
The reason December 23rd was special is because that used to be the day when our entire neighborhood, the one where I grew up in, would get together at the park that was at the center of it, to celebrate Christmas together. Completed with a live Nativity Scene, families would bring food to share, everyone would sing Christmas carols, and the kids would play the roles of the characters in the story of Jesus´ birth.
I have a couple of pictures tattooed in my mind from one of those December 23rds from long ago. Both pictures are from the same night: the night my siblings and I were all playing roles in the live Nativity. My big brother was a wise guy...I mean, one of the Maggi...lol... my big sister was a shepherd and I was the main angel...the one who was inside the stable, standing next to baby Jesus. That was quite the night. I might have been barely 5 years old, but I still remember it, mostly thanks to those 2 pictures I´m talking about. One is of me, bright-eyed, in the middle of the action, inside the stable, between Joseph and Mary...behind the manger...guarding the precious baby Jesus played by a neighborhood infant. Wow! What a moment! The other one, is of me swinging away on one of the park swings, my feet raised up to heaven and my mesh wings flapping in the wind. I guess, after all that hard work guarding baby Jesus, I needed a respite...
My Mom kept that angel outfit for many, many years. And she put the pictures in a photo-album, yes, there was such a thing as those books where people used to store actual pictures. I remember her, once in a while, pulling that photo-album out, looking through the yellowing picture of me swinging away, and merrily saying: "look at this, who has ever seen an angel having so much fun!?" I used to take a look at the angel custom and pictures too, every once in a while...as I wanted to recapture the joy of that night, when I had a front row seat at our neighborhood´s humble re-enactment of the most important event in all history. I remember how thinking of that wonderful moment used to bring smiles to my face then... just as it still does today.
The angel outfit is gone, but I know the pictures are somewhere here. I looked for them, but I'm afraid I've misplaced them. I wanted to take a nice look at them again...sigh...this December 23rd, as I see my thoughts cluttered with worry, and feel my shoulders crumble under the burden of stress. Today, I wanted to reclaim the carefree joy of that night of long ago...but, how? How does an adult in 2020, dealing with a son who has Covid-19, and with the possibility that everyone in the household is infected, deal with the lost joy of Christmas?
Sigh...
Well...I realize that perhaps, like my pictures, the joy had been misplaced as well. I must seek for it, but in the right place. I must come back to the basics: seeking the joy of Jesus.
I have to shift the focus from what I imagined Christmas was supposed to be, and fix my eyes on what Christmas really is: the joy of Jesus, the Emmanuel, God with us. I praise and thank God for sending His Precious Son to die for me ... and for inviting me to be a part of His Royal Family. I praise Him and thank Him for giving me opportunities to trust Him, and for being with me as we sail together through whatever waters He decides to take me, knowing fully well that He is with me, and that wherever we go, we go together...for, the Lord tells us through the prophet,
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