Remember that feeling from when you were young? You could hardly stand to sleep because Christmas morning was right around the corner. Everything seemed magical, and no matter what the next day held, you couldn’t wait for it. With 16 days until baby’s due date, every night feels like Christmas Eve to me. I know that we might have a few more weeks to wait, but I also know that we could be holding our little one any day now, and that’s an amazing realization. There is no wrapped gift under the tree that could compare.

Daily now, I consider new ways that our existence is going to change and be drastically enhanced by the presence of a new life among us. It’s not just that we’ll have the responsibility of raising an impressionable and dependent child, but that we’ve been given the privilege of doing so. All that comes with it, whether trying or incredible, delightful or strange, will sharpen us and grow us and make us better in the long run–in the same way that knowing Christ and celebrating the real Christmas behind all of the presents makes us better. A little babe enters the world and we are changed. We are changed because we accept the reality and significance of what a new life means. We are changed because of the sacrifice that is required out of the gift that’s being given. We are changed because our hearts are softened and broken and reached in new and beautiful ways in the process.

Tonight feels like Christmas Eve, and tomorrow night may as well. And quite possibly the night after. I used to think in growing up that the excitement of an “eve” was wearing off as I got older, but I was terribly mistaken. There has never been a more exciting “eve” in our lives, and in a very powerful way, for a long time to come, our Christmas Eves have been refreshed and are somehow magical again.

with eyes wide open,

mm