This will be a different Christmas - last year was different. I guess they’re all different! (:  As I reflect on these things there is a truth that is absolute. Things change God does not.  My life has changed a great deal in the last 20 months.  I got to thinking about the mother of our Lord.  Talk about change!  So, I got questions!  Perhaps a letter?  

Dear Mary, you don’t know me, but I know your Son, your firstborn, the Lord of all the earth.  Or maybe I should say He knows me, for it’s He alone who searches hearts and minds (Revelations 2:23).  He made me and holds me together.  He’s my hope, Mary.  “My Rock where I seek refuge.” (Psalm 18:2)

What was it like to raise Him, to have the radiance of God’s glory call you “Mother” and the Author of Life play on the floor in your home?  Here’s what gets me:  the Son of the living God ate breakfast at your table and said bedtime prayers in your arms.  Mary, did you suspect that you held the Source of Eternal Salvation in your arms? (Hebrews 5:9)  Did you believe that you tickled the toes of the Alpha and Omega, played peekaboo with the Savior of the world?  What went through your mind as you tucked into bed the Ruler of the kings of the earth (Revelations 1:5) and kissed goodnight the face of God?

What about Joseph?  Did you beg him to listen?  Beg him to stay?  After your talk with Joseph did you sit in confusion?  Did you wonder what God would do next?  Relief must have met you the day of Joseph’s dream. (Praise God!)  I couldn’t have been easy.  Did your neighbors paint you as immoral?  Did your parents believe?  Did Joseph’s parents understand?  And what about the rest of the world?  Wake up, Bethlehem!  Your time in history had come, yet there was no place for you to have God’s precious Son.  Just an animal shelter to welcome the King of Glory.  Is this how the Messiah enters the world?  It doesn’t make sense.

I’m sure you knew the birth of that child would change your life forever, but you couldn’t have known that it would also change my life forever.  Mary, you carried Him then, but it’s He who holds me now in my changing life.  I look forward to meeting you someday.  We can praise Him together.  Until then, Mary, I’m holding tight to your Son.  

Tom