Great Expectations

 Joseph went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.  Luke 2:5

What was Mary expecting?  Yes, I know, a baby.  Thank you Ms. Literal.  No, I am wondering what was she expecting deep down in our soul?  What dreams had she played out in our mind of giving birth to the son of God?  Did she think it would hurt?  Did she think Jesus quote the Torah rather than go through the terrible twos?  Did she think, this will be the best retirement plan ever!  

What did Joseph expect?  Did he expect to see his own eyes in the one he would adopt as his own?  Did he expect that his heart would burst open?  Did he anticipate showing Jesus around his carpenter shop, showing him how to use the tools, gently guiding his hands?

What do you expect this Christmas?  Expectations are a powerful and potent part of our lives.  So often our great expectations go awry.  We expect to be overwhelmed with joy when we open a gift...only to find a store bought fruit cake.  "Gee thanks, Bob.  It's perfect... {softly under your breath} for my dog."  What do you expect when you come to church?  Which carols?  What kind of sermon?  Besides short...believe me, I know.  What do you expect from your family?  What do you expect from yourself?

So much of our faith and our life is about expectations...how to cope when they go unmet.  I often forget this.  I end up going to a party thinking, "This will be awesome."  Only to stand alone and frustrated in the corner.  I end up going to a church meeting thinking, "Ugh...not again"...only to be frustrated.  The powerful thing about expectations is sometimes they are met...sometimes we force them to be met.  

Part of Advent is being honest about your expectations.  What if you took ten minutes today and wrote down your hopes and dreams?  What if you wrote down your fears?  Then offered all that to God with the simple prayer, "Help." And, "Please".  

As the candles of hope and peace are joined by joy this next Sunday, how is that guiding your expectations?  Are you willing to let the One who is constantly turning our world upside down, the One who is born not as a powerful ruler in a palace, but as a pauper, a tiny vulnerable infant in a lowly stable, the One who comes to us not with demands and decrees, but an invitation to be embraced by hope, peace, joy and love set your expectations?  

C.S. Lewis often said that God's love is the "intolerable compliment".  We don't know what do to with such real and raw love.  So we romanticize it and sing, "Away in a Manger" rather than be honest that Jesus probably cried as a baby.  Or we theorize and analyze it, "Obviously this story of Jesus' birth is a myth, made up, due to the historical data that Caesar never would have had a mass migration of people."  Yes, thank you, Mr. Literal for that.  Or we try to keep God's love at arm's length.  But what if our expectation is that God loves us and that God's love will come to us this Christmas time.  Perhaps not in my carefully constructed and planned ways, but come nevertheless.  Because that kind of expectation will offer us more than just a trace of God's grace, it will be the best news ever...because it's true.

With great hope, peace, and joy ~