This is my family's first Christmas in Swaziland. Honestly, I have been dreading it for the past three months! I was expecting to feel homesick, depressed, deprived and just plain rotten for most of the month of December! This Christmas season has certainly been different.

 

...we have a dried aloe plant branch stuck in a pot instead of a live frasier fir evergreen...

...we have 105 degree, sweltering days (and nights) rather than crisp winter mornings with frost and fluffy white snow...

...we are not getting together with long time friends and our extended families...

 

However....different is just different...not bad...after all...

 

...our dried aloe plant branch stuck in a pot isn't dropping needles all over my floor!

...while I may be sweating more this December than any other December I remember, I haven't had to scrape an inch of ice off of my windshield even once!!

...we do miss our long time friends and our families something awful...no getting around that...but God is building a beautiful community around us that is enfolding us into their circle of friends and family which is what the Church is really all about!

 

One thing I am going to miss this year is the candlelight, midnight Christmas Eve service at our church in the States. There is just something about being together in church on Christmas Eve, with the child-like anticipation of Christmas morning which somehow transformed from the longing to know what you might find wrapped under the tree to the longing to know the Savior who left heaven to inhabit the flesh of a helpless babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.  The soft glow of so many candles and the lovely sound of carols being sung by a choir. Our church in Holland, Michigan ends the Christmas Eve service by having everyone silently file out into the atrium to sing 'Silent Night' while holding up lit white candles. It makes me cry just thinking about it...in a good way!

 

As I am sitting out here on my veranda in Africa, the dark and humid night thick around me, I have a single white candle lit on the table. I am humming 'Silent Night'...the chirps and squeaks of various night frogs and insects are joining me in the song...I smell a sweetness in the air from the sugarcane fields surrounding the house...there are a thousand stars lighting up the sky...a sweet puppy is sleeping on my feet...my kids and husband are healthy and safe inside the door...I am so blessed... silent night...holy night...all is calm...all is bright...sleep in heavenly peace...sleep in heavenly peace...

 

However you celebrate Christmas this year, may you experience the holy, wonderful, joyful peace and wonder that I am at this very moment...

 

For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace !  ~  Isaiah 9:6