Ponderings

Dear Mary,

I'm 8 days away (hopefully) from delivering my second child. I've been thinking about you lately, it being Christmas and all. Thought I'd drop you a line and get your thoughts on your gestation of Jesus.

First, kudos to you regarding the last trimester donkey ride. Even sitting on a couch for hours causes my derriere to complain and I'm not hitting any rough terrain. The Bible is pretty quiet about your thoughts on this. I'm sure you didn't relish the road trip, but I imagine that you took it graciously. 

If I may be so bold, I have to admit something: If some angel told me that I was about to bear the Son of God, I would have shouted, "Score! I'm set! Bring on the dainties!" I would have expected (humbly, of course) the red carpet treatment. I would have anticipated comfortable accommodations, a 4-star labor and delivery unit and maybe some other perks. Free raisin cakes or something. I don't know. 

I'm pretty certain that with your humble status and station in life, you were not a "taker". In fact, given that marriage was so important for the provisions of women, I'm very impressed that when you were told that you were "with child" before marriage that you didn't say, "Well, isn't this a peach of a situation." You would've had the right to do that. But you didn't. You trusted God.

When I think of the arrival of your Son, I love how the story unfolds: A weary nation longs for their Messiah and is given prophecies of His coming. Clinging to these words, they look longingly at the horizon and see... no white horse. No shining armor. No manna from the sky. No burning bush. Nothing extraordinary to which they are accustomed.

With the exception of that whole heavenly host chorus, they see: the ordinary. Actually, the ordinary is too hard to see. They refuse to believe that their King would come in such a way: born to a couple who have no clout in life, begotten in a vary unusual--even scandalous?-- way, and introduced first to some drunken shepherds and far-out kings who have a thing for astronomy. Not exactly the first visitors I would want to visit MY baby.

It's a story that turns "majesty" on its head. I love this story. 

My absolute favorite part of the story is how you "pondered all these things in your heart". I can't relate to most of your gestation: the lack of a baby shower, the hairy ambulance ride to your delivery quarters and the first odd visitors are not how we birth babies these days. But the "pondering"... oh yes. What a beautiful way to describe all the chaotic combination of emotions: the clash of joys and sorrows and pains and elations that make up that. One. Moment. 

Pondered.

I hope you're not offended, but compared to you, I'm pretty decked out, ready for this baby to arrive. We're not alike in this way at all. I have a few more material possessions at my disposal. (And they're not all bad, either... wipes warmers are a neat invention.) 

But I do share your heart during this special season of life. And I'm glad to share this holy moment with you: of life, of birth, of "oh-my-God-you-chose-me" and, and, of ponderings.

Yours,

Emily