Creation Care Mom

As I sit here today, my son and my husband, Matt, are both napping. The stomach flu came raging through this week and both of them ended up with it. Not sure how I escaped, maybe I’ve just had more recent exposure through my work in the schools?

That being said. It’s been a wild week especially when you throw in sickness into the holiday craziness.

One of the very amazing and special things about the season of advent is to sit with specific words for a week. To meditate on what they meant for the Israelite people at the time of Christ’s birth and to also ponder the way that the word shows up for us today.

I’ve been thinking a LOT about hope recently. Hope is a gift because it is the antithesis to despair. In times of uncertainty, clinging to hope may be the only thing keeping us out of the despair spiral. Hope can be for the soon future or the far off future. Hope brings us to action rather than a feeling of stuck. In the world of climate work, hope is absolutely necessary.

I subscribe to many news sources to keep up with the climate work and climate inaction that is occurring across the globe. (Examples are NYT Climate Forward, Heatmap News, Inside Climate News, Katherine Hayhoe’s newsletter) Most days, I receive news that brings me hope…and news that could make me despair. Some days it can seem as if we are hurtling towards planetary destruction and humanity’s extinction and other days human ingenuity and problem solving show how we are finding our way out.

Of course election season and outcomes can leave despair in its wake. It can be difficult to find the hope. But it’s there, even as a flicker. You may have to look to alternative sources to find it. There are still people doing what is right, good, and compassionate. You could be one of them.

During the Christmas season, there are signs of hope everywhere. Lights that twinkle in the darkness. Candles in your advent wreath. Surprising generosity. Warm drinks and cozy blankets. But most of all, a child in a manger.

Jesus came into a world that felt dark and bleak. Political power and might crushed most. Religious leaders had twisted God’s intentions. His earthly parents had no wealth or influence. No words from God had been spoken for 400 years. I’m sure the sense of despair was palpable even as they hoped in a long given promise.

And yet,

A baby’s cry is joy to the world.

This birth is hope.

Much anticipated.

The lifter of despair.

He came. He grew up. He changed the world. Not in the way expected, but in best way.

And so I know, that as I seek hope through the season, and as I wrestle with heartache and despair of how the world is, he is ever present, understanding it all. He gets it. I can lean into hope because he has the final say.

Redeemer. Healer. Reconcilator.

He is mine. I am his.