Finding Christmas

Christmas is just over a week away. If you live in the states it is common knowledge. Just look around. From Thanksgiving to January first the holidays are here. Trimming the tree, buying and giving gifts, drinking egg nog and baking Christmas cookies; parties, festivals, and church services fill our calendar; we watch Christmas movies, we visit family, and the whole time we are surrounded by dazzling lights and displays. There is no doubt that it is a beautiful time of the year.

And here I am, in Ukraine, a country where Christmas is not only not that big of a deal but isn’t celebrated until January 7th. I find myself longing for the Christmas spirit to just show up. But it never comes. I miss gazing at store windows, watching the light of the Christmas lights dancing on the snow, the scratches on my hands from putting up my 12th Christmas tree, and that feeling of awe in the pit of your stomach when you read the Christmas story for at least the 150th time. It’s that feeling of knowing that you are celebrating something so big you cannot comprehend it.

We use December 25th to remember a time when God came to earth as man, when a baby was born of a virgin, a time of miraculous signs and wonders. As I trudge through the cold and the mud, I wonder “Where is Christmas?” I asked God, “Where is the awe and the wonder of the season?” And He answered.

It was a day like any other day. I woke up, worked in my room until it was time to go to the children’s center to help kids with English. I bundled up from head to toe. It was cold out, which was to be sure. But when I walked out the door I found something more than cold. God had created something more beautiful than Christmas lights or shop windows. It was white- EVERYWHERE! Every tree, every fence, every electric line, every blade of grass was white. It was as if someone had sucked up all the water from the muddy ground, threw it on the trees and froze it into tiny little white crystals. It was as if something had come down from the white sky and breathed a layer of frost onto the whole earth. And as I walked among this winter wonderland, I gawked in awe at what God had done- He found the spirit of Christmas and He shared it with me. I just wish I would have had my camera.