Sunday, December 20, 2015

Our Christmas Letter 2015

                                                                                                                                December 2015
Dear Friends,
            Do you feel what I have been feeling lately?  When will the bad news end!?! If it’s not an ISIS execution, it’s a mass shooting in our own country.   On Facebook, I see images of refugees flooding Europe and ostentatious politicians talking about building a wall.  Racial tensions in America are high to say the least. 
            Unfortunately, bad news doesn’t stay on the headlines.  Linda’s family has had a rough year.  The news of her youngest sister, Laurie’s, advanced cancer hit us hard.  Then her mom had another cancer scare from a spot on her leg.  This is her third bout with this disease.  As I write, the cancer battles are over for now, but in an awkward accident Linda’s mother now broke both her arms.
            Then I think of the many crises too personal to write about in a public letter like this.  I think you know the kind I am talking about.  Perhaps you are living one right now.  I am talking about those crises that couple pain with shame.  These are especially painful because they involve real choices and complex levels of participation by us all.  We, along with our friends and family, are experiencing such crises this year -- and I know many of you reading this letter can identify.  
            And it’s not just the bad news, there is also sad news.  We said good-bye to more friends when Josh and Tonya Good left our city, the third couple with kids the age of ours who have left the area recently. We miss all three couples dearly.  
            Doesn’t it seem like there could be some good news instead?  I bravely intended to run a half marathon this year in honor of my mother.  It was her birthday, 20 years after her passing, but my run turned out to be more of a hobble.  I finished “gloriously” with all the power walking elderly ladies.
            Linda bravely launched into homeschooling this year.  There is joy in it to be sure, but some days we wonder about our decision. 
            Then there are the thorns and thistles promised in Genesis.  For me they come in the form of collapsing sewer pipes and crumbling chimneys.  It has been a month without heat.  Electric heaters help except that they blow the breakers! Thank God for gracious tenants on the first floor and basement.
            So what is going on?
            And how can we celebrate the season in the middle of such realities? 
            I am comforted with this, the One who is above all of this entered this.  He became a refugee in Egypt.  His birth prompted a massacre.  ISIS is not new, mass killings are not a rarity in human history. Racism has existed for a long time.  Suffering is not uncommon. It is what this world is made of. 
            When the Herschberger family gathered for a bitter-sweet time of dispersing dad’s things this summer, I found a well-read book on dad’s shelf, The Gospel According to Job.   The message is refreshingly real.  The miserable comforters still exist today.  They like to tally up who has been naughty and nice, but there is a cry coming from the ash heap, “I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth” (Job 19:25).   In his amazing, pre-religious faith, Job knew what he needed.  He needed a Redeemer.  Fortunately, for us, He has come.

          - Lowell (for the Herschbergers)

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