We live in a world filled with weariness. We search and search for the deepest things in life: peace, rest, identity, and joy. Is there a home where we can find such treasure? There is! Do you know where we find it? In a barn of all places!
We live in a world filled with weariness. We search and search for the deepest things in life: peace, rest, identity, and joy. Is there a home where we can find such treasure? There is! Do you know where we find it? In a barn of all places!
Will there ever be a home for me? A 12-year-old girl peeks through the crack in her bedroom door. In that 3-inch vantage point, she sees a family united for the first time. She used to drink in the sight of the joy-filled tears and the melting smiles, imagining her own hug and laughter. But now, as another foster sibling is welcomed home, she averts her eyes, tears seeping into her pillow. Will there ever be a home for me? She runs into the crumbling refuge of her mind, seeking answers she knows deep down she’ll never find. “What child am I that no one wants me? What child am I who’s so unlovable? What child am I, merely damaged goods, unworthy of a home, too far gone for a family? Destined to miss out on a sense of belonging?”
It all happened in a scroll of a touch screen. He entered college life knowing no one on campus, but four months later, he finally felt like he belonged, a friend group where he fit in. His friends had told him they’d be out of town for the weekend, each heading home for a surprise family visit. But on Saturday night, as he sat alone in his dorm, he swiped post after post until he saw his friends’ three smiling faces as they hiked a national park just three hours away from campus. They chose to have fun without him. His world never seemed lonelier. “Why didn’t they invite me?” “Will I ever fit in?” “Will I ever experience life fully?” “What child am I who seems to drive close relationships away without even trying?” “What child am I to have life circumstances that seem to drive me further into isolation and disassociation?”
At 57 years old, she felt disassociated from her reality. Her memories invite her over and over to take an extended trip down that familiar lane, trying to live once more in times past, knowing what is past cannot become future. How did she get here? Her work which used to be a fountain of joy and fulfillment now had become an every-day rendezvous of energy-draining drudgery and optimism-deteriorating perfunctory. If she had fully known all those years ago what this occupation would be like, she would have turned it down. If she would’ve known all she needed to give up, she would’ve never moved. If she would’ve known the feelings of distance and frustration she would face, she would’ve stayed put. Now, she cannot help but look over the proverbial fence, wondering what life could be if she was somewhere else. Constantly wishing to have that home feel again, surrounded by people who treated her as family, to find satisfaction and joy in her work. “What child am I that my life situation has led to missing out on joy and fulfillment for years?” “What child am I who feels like I don’t belong, or even that I don’t want to belong?”
Have you come here tonight feeling like that 12-year girl lost in her foster-home, trudging through life trying to find deep human connections, only to feel like damaged goods that no one could truly love, all the while seeing the people around you finding their own version of home and family?
Have you walked through these doors like that college student? Thinking you had found home, closeness, only to see that closeness from the outside looking in, missing out once again, and feeling loneliness’s touch on your shoulder?
Have you arrived this Christmas Eve like that 57-year old woman, feeling drained, pessimistic, weary and out of touch, wondering why your life circumstances are so far different from your envisioning of life, questioning if you’ll ever capture that elusive combination of home, fulfillment, and satisfaction?
Young people call it FOMO, the “fear of missing out.” Widowers call it a “lonely heart.” Authors see it as a “wandering soul.” Are you feeling left behind? What child are you? Are you a child feeling like you have no place in this world, like a stranger unrecognizable? Are you a child reaching out for warmth and home, but feeling rejected and cold?
Do you wonder if that’s how God views you, as a lost child, unworthy of home and happiness? Is this constant vagabond life the story God has written for you? Have you given up on hoping for a place where you belong? Are you coping, trying to process why you have missed out on so much? What child are you? Will there ever be room and welcome, a home, for you?
If you are seeing life through the lens of that 12-year-old girl, can you hear the voice of a girl only a handful of years older? You seek to find where her voice is coming from, and you see a barn. You listen closer and you hear a baby crying, breathing in this world’s air for the first time. You gingerly approach the scene, no longer peering past your bedroom door to rediscover how unwanted you are, but peering into a feeding trough to find the most unexpected home you could have never anticipated. A home found in a newborn baby’s eyes, a home meant for another world.
If you are reeling from being left out of meaningful and real relationships like that college student, do you catch sight of the tears puddling on a man’s face, weary from travel and exhaustion? Do you listen as he gets choked up, as he holds his adopted Son, and meets eye to eye with Someone who will always remain at his side? Can you imagine him passing Him off into your arms, the more you hold Him close, the more his fingers wrap around your thumb, and the more your fear of missing out dissipates, only to be replaced by a warmth that will never leave you?
If you are feeling disconnected from life like that 57-year-old woman, do you feel the tug of a shepherd’s hand? Do you struggle to keep up with him as he nearly drags you to the stable? Can you hear his scattered, stuttered, and spilling words of angels and glory, peace and goodwill? Does he share how he too thought his life was an unnavigable dead-end, an unappreciated task, an unfulfilling burden? Now, you stand at his side, finding yourself marveling at a most common sight, a baby in the arms of his mother, and yet in this seemingly simple and insignificant moment, you discover the purpose and reason for your lot in life. Everything once disassociated and distant is connected and close to home. Fulfillment and joy are all you feel.
What child are you? A child of 12 years, 18 years, or 57 years? We’re asking the wrong question. What’s the right one? You know it full well: What child is this?
This is the Child who once had the warmest of homes, the most loving of fathers, yet chose to enter into our world knowing his own would never receive him, knowing he would live a homeless life, knowing the very world he sang into being, would never sing his praises in return. This Christ-child would be seen as unlovable and unwanted, his heart breaking as he was rejected. Yet, this is the Child who would live in such a cold, lonely environment, so one day he could wrap his arms around you in the warmest of homes forever.
This is the Child, who would be left out and left behind by his friends. He knew loneliness as his constant companion. He knew weariness. He felt the emptiness of isolation, the sweat of abandonment. This is the Child, who would walk the lonely valley of death, so one day, you would never feel isolated and left alone. This is the Child who entered your sorrow because he longed to be your best friend. He knew heaven wouldn’t be complete without you. He gave up his life, strapping your loneliness to his back, so you could experience how significant you are to Him, how much He wants you at his side.
This is the Child who would be teary-eyed as he held the hands of childless widows. This is the Child whose hands would touch the eyes of the blind, unmasking a whole new painting of life, where joy and fulfillment, not dissatisfaction and disassociation, would be the scenery all around. This is the Child, who would one day press into the holes of his hands on one Sunday morning in the spring, the very first Easter, smiling as he thought of you, and how his scars have given you victory, forgiveness, purpose and meaning in this often weary-filled life.
What Child is this who would build you a home? What Child is this who would leave his family, only to take you by the hand to the Father you always hoped for? What Child is this who sings songs of joy over you? What Child is this who loves you more than you will ever know? What Child is this who died on a cross for you? You know him by a name, spoken in hushed tones on a Christmas night long ago: “Jesus.” A name where you find your true home. Is there room and welcome there for you? There is. Welcome home, dear child of God. Amen.