An Unexpected Gift this Christmas

It's Christmas day. I currently sit in a tank top and shorts by a Christmas tree and two giant boxes which are full of presents which will be opened by my roommate upon her return in a week and a half. The only thing that's been white about this Christmas is my skin. This year is my first Christmas on the field, my first Christmas "alone". And amidst a holiday season full of striving, of discontentment, tonight I find my first night of that "silent night"-y kind of peace.

An old roommate Christmas pic <3

Flashback to the last few weeks. Thanksgiving hits. Ugh, it's the holiday season. Can't go home. This will be the worst. My roommate gets to go home. In fact, all of my friends here are leaving me. Why can't Christmas just not happen? And why do we need a break? This sounds like a terrible idea. *Insert more Grinch-like, emo-esque comments* The fact is this holiday season, I didn't feel like I has a whole lot to look forward to. Instead the holidays have felt more like a taunt reminding me of the life I once knew, the people I once would have spent this season with who I miss way too much. My family who I would watch Rudolph with every Christmas eve as we devoured massive amounts of cookies and hot chocolate as we lounged in hoodies and sweatpants after church. My old roommates who I would gather with for a "family" Christmas party every year between Christmas and New Year's. The friends I would always catch up with since the holidays was one of the only times I was home. All things I have been missing terribly as this holiday season hits me here away in the mission field.

The holidays aren't an awesome time for everyone. And sometimes every "What are you doing for Christmas?" becomes this terrible taunt reminding people of what they no longer have. And I think there is an okay-ness with grieving that. But never let us stay in that grief and self-pity. If we dwell there, if we set up our tents and live there, we live in denial of the hope and joy that is in the very message of Christmas. 

See let's go back to what Christmas is about.

Genesis 1 and 2: Perfect world. Man and God walk together and chill. All is well.

Genesis 3: BOOM! CRASH! You had only one rule Eve! Really????
Later in Genesis 3: God "Curse....blah, blah, blah. Eve, you and this serpent will be enemies now. He's going to be on the prowl looking to attack you. BUT WAIT, you will have a descendant who CRUSHES HIS HEAD!" *Hope shimmers as Adam and Eve wait for a son to break that curse*

Genesis 4-5: People kicked out of garden, and world keeps taking turns for the worst. With every new child, the whisper of hope kicks in. Maybe this son will be the one that will crush the serpent's head. Take for example Genesis 5:29 "He named him Noah and said, 'He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the Lord has cursed.'" Sounds like someone who will reverse the curse, no?

But every son comes up short. Even the comparatively righteous, like Noah, seems to fall short of the promised destroyer of the curse. The world falls more and more apart. So God renews his promise. God continually gives throughout the Old Testament these details, most hidden among descriptions of terrible things that are going on, of what this Messiah will be like. He's going to restore us to God. He will be a king with all authority and rule. He's going to bring justice. He will be our Emmanuel, God with us. He's everything that these inhabitants of earth, these people who fall further and further from God because of that silly curse, need and could not be themselves. And after waiting and waiting, after wondering time after time "Is this the one?", I'm sure they got tired of waiting. Where are you God and where is this promise? It really is too good to be true isn't it? I'm sure many gave up hope after waiting so long.

But behold, then Jesus does come born in the lowliest of stables, declared to the men of little importance in society, shepherds. And this little baby really is too good to be true. He's the Promised One. He's our Emmanuel, God with us. He lives the life we could never live and then crushes the serpent once and for all on the cross. He counteracts the curse, allowing us to have a relationship with God that is tighter than the garden. He brings in not just the era of God with us, but his death brings the era of God in us. Never again are we alone. Never again do we have to live dreadfully separated from God and all hope. And no longer do we wait, because we already have.

That's the message of Christmas. The Long Awaited One has come. He is the present that humanity needed. The only present that I need. See, the other things that I miss this Christmas are awesome, above and beyond things that the Lord has really blessed me with. But what God has challenged me with this Christmas is the question, "Am I enough? Am I truly the thing your contentment and joy are built on or is it built on my gifts?" See my Lord gives good gifts; you might even say He's the best at it. But when we need those gifts, not realizing we already have everything we need in Jesus, not realizing how much we have already been given in Jesus, we live taking for granted the very thing mankind has been waiting for since the curse. With this realization in hand, I spent most of my afternoon posted up in a hammock with my Bible chilling with Jesus. I had my own candlelight service under my Christmas tree. I spent my day with my Savior, because He is enough. And upon realizing that, Christmas went from dreaded to a blessed day indeed.

And with that I just want to leave you with Joy to the World (because it speaks of that joy we can have now that the curse has been undone):

Joy to the world! The Lord has comeLet earth receive her King!Let every heart prepare Him room
And heaven and nature singAnd heaven and nature singAnd heaven, and heaven and nature sing

Joy to the world! the Savior reignsLet men their songs employWhile fields and floodsRocks, hills and plainsRepeat the sounding joyRepeat the sounding joyRepeat, repeat the sounding joy

No more let sins and sorrows growNor thorns infest the ground;He comes to make His blessings flowFar as the curse is found.As the curse is found.

*Also for those back home who are wondering, or are like "Man I feel terrible that Kacie was so alone over Christmas", people did take me in. The last few days I've been running around like crazy doing Christmas-y things with different families and friends I've met here. Even today on Christmas, I went to a family's house for an awesome breakfast and Christmas celebration. Don't worry, I am being taken care of ;)

The Kids I Serve

I remember some of the conversations I had with people when I first decided to become a missionary and move to the other side of the world. Because where I come from, doing something so different comes off as crazy. And even more so when I said, "No, it's not me on the front line of missions, reaching the people in the bush that have never heard the Gospel or building an orphanage or planting a church or (fill in the blank with some super spiritual thing here). Instead I will be assisting those missionaries with their work indirectly by teaching their children." And although I believed this work was important, I also believed that it was nothing compared to what those "real" missionaries were doing on the front lines. I was just happy to help and happy to learn to serve by doing the behind the scenes work. 

But now I've gotten to know the kids I moved halfway across the world for. And as recently I've been thinking about them a lot, I've come to realize how much my job is not behind the scenes but is on the front lines fighting for Jesus. And if you're not sure that you agree with me yet, let me tell you just a little about the kids I serve. 

There's a few middle school boys and girls that I teach Bible to every day but don't know Christ yet. They're convinced that if there is a heaven and hell, if they just buckle up and work to be a good enough person, they'll get to heaven. I can't even imagine how exhausting that way of thinking must be. And it's such a privilege because I get to teach them the Bible everyday. And I get to build those relationships with them out of class whether at the lunch table, on the court, or in the hallway where I can model for them what hope, what joy, what peace a Christian life has to offer. My prayer is these little homies come to know Christ because they're the lost that I get to preach to.

Then there's the middle school boys and girls that do know and love Jesus, but are still trying to figure out what that means for their lives (because after all, which of us isn't doing this still?) This last semester, we've been going through the book of Proverbs, aka God's will for my everyday interactions, and I've been challenging them daily to think critically about the things God asks of us. To think critically about the arguments of the Bible and the arguments of the world and see what make sense. To apply their knowledge to situations going on in the world around us (we've spent the last few weeks talking about the Syrian refugee crisis and the Paris terrorist attacks). My prayer is that these kids become warriors for Christ who go out and offer hope and peace to those around them. My prayer is that they wouldn't be the Christians who sit in the pews Sunday but live their life however they want Monday, but live their entire life in view of who God is and what He has called us to. 

There's the juniors and seniors in high school that soon will venture out in the real world. They're about to leave their Christian bubble and hit a total culture and spiritual shock. Without an identity rooted in Christ, their faiths may very well sink. And some of them just don't know. Their faith hasn't been tested, it hasn't been tried, and they need to figure out what they believe. Or it has been tested, and though we would never speak of it in public, through all of the tests they don't know how there could be a God, or a God that loves them at least. Some of them feel forgotten by God. I've sat down and had the conversations. Some of them I meet with regularly as we're trying to sort out what they believe. My prayer is that these young friends of mine also come to find that God is real, God is with them and God wants to offer them an abundant, full and exciting relationship with Him. 

There's the girls I coach that I get to speak confidence into. That I get to tell regularly that they're not defined by their performance, but by who they are in Christ. That I'll love them whether they make or miss that buzzer beater, but I'll still challenge them to be better. My prayer God would be using these relationships to teach these girls about who they are and who they can grow into being someday. 

There's the students that I teach that are totally misguided. And sometimes I have to sit down and have the hard conversations with them about cheating or maintaining their integrity as a Christian. Who I sometimes have to work hard to extend my forgiveness to, but at the same time teach them to do what is right. My prayer is these students would grow up to be men and women of integrity who not only do what is right, but stand up for what is right and just and fair in this world. 

So am I on the front line of missions? Yeah, I would say I'm building up the church and preaching to the lost. I would say the work I do every day is important work that the Lord has asked of me. Whether I expected it or not, these little friends of mine needed Christ more than I ever could have known or imagined, but the more I get to know them the more I see that. And my guess, my reader, is that the more you get to know those around you, the more you'll see that God wants you to be fighting for their hearts, working to bring justice, peace and hope to those around you too. 

As for me, keep praying for me and those crazy kids I serve.