Holiday Hope

I am a December Girl. 

My birthday comes early in the month and has never been overshadowed by the holidays. Growing up, my family chose to decorate our fresh cut pine tree on my birthday and endure the judgments of others that we were rushing things. This was before the present trend that Christmas-starts-the-day-after-Halloween. 

Later in December is of course Christmas, my absolute favorite season of year. I yearn to begin playing my huge collection of holiday tunes and usually restrain myself to the end (okay, middle) of November. The foods, the decorations, the events, and the chance to focus on Jesus as His birth is publicly celebrated are all treats I adore.

Then I moved to a place where there was no sign of the holiday–Afghanistan. No window displays boasted yuletide colors or twinkling lights. No recorded melodies like Jingle Bells or Joy to the World came through shop speakers. No Nativity scenes or even Santas appeared anywhere. Depressing.

PLEASE CELEBRATE ME HOME

Working overseas as the principal in an international school afforded summer and mid-year breaks built into the yearly calendar. With one round-trip ticket included in our benefits, my husband and I paid the costs to return home to the U.S. a second time each year. I had my December flights booked by September. It was one of the carrots that kept me going in my stressful, restricted world as an American woman leader in male-dominated Afghanistan. 

The work was significant and kept me busy and fully occupied. I never doubted the impact of our educational endeavors. We planted top standard seeds in all our K-12 grade students and knew the harvest would be worthwhile. We watched our graduates enroll in universities around the world and many have returned to rebuild their beloved country.

But, truthfully, I never enjoyed living in my second home. Over the seven years of my two-continent-life, December became more of a treasure than it had always been. 

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS 

When I arrived back to Missouri from Kabul that first Christmas, I opened my front door to a magical, picturesque scene. Our family home was fully decorated by some elf-ladies from our local support team. I sat with a cup of tea in the wonderland many hours during the next days, allowing the festive display to restore my joy and contentment. 

In all honesty, I wasn’t craving spiritual renewal at those times, not in the first days at home. I cherished sleeping in my own bed, making breakfast in my kitchen of 20-plus years, walking on amazing paved streets and sidewalks, and moving freely wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted without first checking security clearances or reserving a driver or wearing a cumbersome headscarf. Having the chance to stop being a foreign woman principal 24/7 and just be Mom or Friend felt relaxing and easy.

During those Kabul years, Christmas became more about being home and less about the birth of my Savior. Not a great confession from a missionary.

JESUS IS THE REASON 

Every year at our return visits, our local church asked my pastor husband to preach about what God was doing in Afghanistan among new Muslim Background Believers and how Jesus was becoming known in that desolate place.

Then I would share our personal update. I always teared up at some point, either in boasting of my school’s achievements or in my personal struggles of homesickness, daily work and living challenges, and missing the life I left behind. 

I was trying to faithfully live each day in the Afghanistan destiny Jesus laid out for me to follow, not my husband, not every Christian, me. Every year I wanted to remain home but could not dismiss the clear call to remain at my position of service until released in my heart. 

Coming home at Christmas during the Kabul years was a gift from a loving Father to one of His struggling servants. I received it in the same way I received God’s gift of the baby born in Bethlehem to all humankind that First Christmas─with overflowing gratitude and desire to follow hard after Him. 

The gift of life in Christ is the source of my hope and joy to continue serving wherever I find myself. Christmas is a special, shiny, star-shaped symbol of that hope.