Almost There

We’re almost there!

That statement got me through more family road trips than any other utterance from my parents. Suddenly, the impossible distance between home and Chicago where my grandparents lived did not seem like the endless slog through the wilderness it could be. There was hope. There was an end. 

As we draw nearer to Christmas morning, that same feeling begins to dawn within us—almost there.

For some of us, it is the deep sigh of relief that the office is about to close, and we can now get down to the real business of celebrating with kith and kin. We can see that last deadline coming. We are about to be free. I know a lot of the students among us felt that as the last exam period came—almost there, then home; almost there, then the holidays—and, hopefully, the English teacher for our grade school kids did not see fit to have “War and Peace” read by the time class resumes! 

That experience is a real taste of liberating grace. A burden is lifted. A soul is freed. That feels good—really good. There is a momentary touch of flying. 

For some of us, it is a near explosion of pent-up expectation. This experience most often touches the youngest among us as the BIG DAY is almost here! Santa is coming! It is almost about to burst upon us! Infected children bounce, flit, fly, leap, and bubble over with the near-boiling of excitement. Grandparents offer no help at all as they sugar up the little engines with Christmas cookies, cocoa, and chocolates, then send them back home—you wonder where that gleeful grin comes from on grandma’s face? Payback, my love, payback…

For us adults, the question becomes, “When was the last time you felt that excited about much of anything?” That’s an important question for us to consider, and it is one that is actually quite serious. Long, long, LONG ago, God created the heavens and the earth and us within it and declared the whole works VERY GOOD. Is that something we experience day to day? Is that something that touches our hearts? There is a lot to be excited about that we slough off with astounding ease—the wonder of bright new dawn, the wonder of being alive to see it, the wonder of hearing the birds erupt in winter cold, the wonder of tasting a really good orange—see? Miracles all around us, and God gives them to us freely to enjoy. A pastor colleague of mine posted on Facebook a couple of days ago, “The goal of life in Jesus Christ is to be faithful—not to be happy.” Well, bah, humbug! I know that in Christ, we still continue to be as human as ever, that suffering will still come, and that we will still know there will be a last day for each of us, even those we love dearly, BUT—that does nothing to change the essential, existential goodness of being here. We are all still children of God, and there is miracle in the air every single day we breathe, often in the midst of our suffering—recall Psalm 23’s great assurance—where did the Psalmist feel God’s closest proximity? Right there in the valley of the shadow of death. We do not deny suffering or blithely dismiss it, but we can know that God is omnicompetent to see us through it to the quenching joy of being redeemed. That is exciting! Let it be so.

But that does bring us to some more of us for whom the message of “almost there” is a whispered “almost over,” a word greeted with a deep sigh of relief, too. The Baptist church near my home met these folks directly and, I hope, pastorally with their advertised sermon series for Advent—“Dealing with Holiday Stress”—and, so far, they’ve tackled financial stress, family stress, etc. These souls remind us that the holidays get warped and turned in our culture, not by them, but by the unreal expectations heaped on the month by marketers, promoters, icons, and so on—if you aren’t just giddy to bursting, then something is seriously WRONG with you! If you don’t understand that love is expressed by a endless string of zeroes after a dollar sign, then you JUST DON’T GET IT! These poor souls collapse under the pressure. They feel lost, enfeebled, and distressed. Just get to January 3rd—by then things will calm down and get back to normal. Almost there.

Now, the call here is to remember the source of the depth of joy for this season. The angel sang of good news of great joy for all people because in a backwoods, bumpkin village, a baby was born, ignored by everyone but a batch of smelly shepherds. God remembered the Least of These, joined them in blessed sweet communion, entering their existence so fully and completely that God shone light that no darkness could dim. That is joy. That is drinking deeply from the refreshing well of grace, quenching all angst, anxiety, and anger. Now, realize that the angel sang because God intends for all of us to become the implements of this joy for one another. God wants us fully in the party. So, do so and be so. How? Listen to someone fully and without distraction. Walk with them wherever they are going. Be with them as they are. Love them. Care for them. That is meeting God as God meets us. And that, too, is real and actual joy.

Almost there.