By Piper Lin —
This year, our Christmas was small and intimate with just my aunt, Gary’s mom, and Connie’s family. We hosted the dinner and decided to do it the Taiwanese way – hotpot on our little dining table. It was refreshingly different, low stress and delicious. The night was beautiful with snow falling steadily outside, and holiday lights twinkling inside (Gary hung them up all around our dining room last minute, it’s lovely.) The kids ate lots of sweets, and got so many presents (which asks for a separate post later.)
The embarrassing truth is, I wasn’t feeling lovely at all in the weeks leading up to Christmas. I was feeling down and doing a lot of self-pitying over this lingering sickness I’ve had (the isolation and the inability to function like my normal self killed me), the stress of holiday shopping, the family photos not turning out well in prints, the guilt of not doing Christmas cards this year, the lack of ‘me time’ to pursue new passions, and the hard fact that we won’t get to see my sister and family in Taiwan this year.
But then a week before Christmas, while mindlessly scrolling through my email inbox, I clicked on this company‘s newsletter (that I normally just delete without reading) and was struck by this line: “embrace your season because your season is RIGHT NOW.”
I paused, and pondered.
As much as I’d like to deny it, a part of me does think that once Cece is older, I’d hopefully be able to sleep better, have more time for myself and Gary, and maybe find a job to bring in extra income to fund our Taiwan trips. As much as I’d like to say I stay present in my day-to-day, a part of me wishes we could go back to the family reunion last winter, while another part of me is simply trying to get through each day, and hope tomorrow I’d wake up without a painful headache and hurting jaw.
Elle says it well: “…but there is beauty in every moment of every day, even the darkest and saddest.” How true is that? Things may never be perfect, and while I sit and wish the hard times away, there is joy in every moment of every day, ready to be recognized, embraced and soaked in. As a child of God, this can’t be more true because He is faithful, His love is constant and I know He has the best plan for every stage of our lives.
So, I’m embracing my season right now, headaches and loneliness and all, and will continue it as my chosen phrase for the coming new year.
Hi I’m Piper! I am married to Gary, my love-at-first-sight when I was 16. We live in Gary’s hometown, Seattle, WA, and together we are raising four little amazing humans who sometimes we can’t believe are ours. I created my blog as a space as a way to practice self-care: here you can find me writing about motherhood reflections, bit + pieces of our family life, and things I love and find inspiring at pipesiclediaries.wordpress.com
by David Pott
Today’s post, a meditation on Malcolm Brocklesby’s: Madonna of the Cross was first published on ArtWay.eu and is reposted with permission. I was particularly impacted by the way the figure of the Madonna is integral with that of the Cross.
——————————————————————————————————————–
Mount Grace Priory near Northallerton in Yorkshire, England is a remarkable place to visit. Between 1398 and the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539 it was home to a community of hermit monks of the Carthusian order. The ruins of the cells of the monks surround a spacious courtyard and one cell has been restored.
Holman Hunt’s The Shadow of Death
On the site of the high altar there is what from a distance appears to be a cross, but as you get closer it is clear that it is a very striking sculpture of Mary offering the Christ Child for God’s purposes. The sculptor was Malcolm Brocklesby who lived from 1933 to 2010. His original inspiration for this work came from Holman Hunt’s The Shadow of Death (c. 1873) which is in the Manchester Art Gallery. In that painting Jesus is stretching out his arms after a hard day’s work in Joseph’s workshop and the evening sun casts a shadow on the wall behind. Mary, who is kneeling, sees the shadow as a premonition of Christ’s crucifixion.
Brocklesby had in mind to make a statue of the Madonna herself as a portent of the crucifixion and that if it was displayed, it would be lit in the low foreground to cast a shadow on the wall behind. However, as he worked on the maquette it seemed logical to fashion the back of the figure itself as the cross. This determined Mary’s posture with her shoulders back and with her arms horizontal, holding the Christ Child high in a position of dedication.
Malcolm Brocklesby: Madonna of the Cross
An inscription on the plaque in front of the sculpture outlines the message Brocklesby wanted to convey:
This Madonna is not the meek and subservient figure portrayed in many Renaissance works, but a determined and intelligent young woman who understands the wonder and the importance of her calling as she dedicates her Child to the purpose of her Creator. She is also aware of the suffering that this will entail. The figure of the Madonna is integral with that of the Cross, the stark and terrible symbol at the heart of Christianity, which is an inescapable part of her existence. Her expression, however, is more of serenity than anguish. She is looking beyond Calvary to the Resurrection and the way in which she holds the Christ Child high suggests the subsequent Ascension rather than the immediate prospect of a sacrificial death.
It is noticeable that Mary’s dress, with the rope tied around her waist, is a reminder of the monks who lived and worshipped on this site. Perhaps the sculptor fashioned his work in such a way that the figure can be seen as either male or female and so can speak to everyone about giving all that we have to God.
Malcolm Brocklesby: Madonna of the Cross
Mary stands erect offering her only son, just as Abraham was ready to sacrifice Isaac and God was ready to give his only Son. It is a position of total vulnerability and availability to God. This is the crossed-out life, indeed from behind the sculpture only the cross remains. Mary is fused with Christ in the cruciform shape. “I am crucified with Christ,” St. Paul says to describe this loss of ego and abandonment to the will of God.
*******
Malcolm Brocklesby: Madonna of the Cross, 1996, Mount Grace Priory, Yorkshire, England.
Malcolm Brocklesby (1933-2010) was a mining engineer who took up sculpture. His sculptures are in numerous collections in Yorkshire and beyond, his best-known pieces being his military figures The Defenders at Helmsley Castle and his Madonna of the Cross on the high altar at Mount Grace Priory.
With David Pott in Bishop Auckland
David Pott lives near Bishop Auckland in County Durham. He has had a long interest in the history of monastic communities and the development of new monastic communities. David and his wife Pam are companions of the Northumbria Community, see www.northumbriacommunity.org.
For information about visiting Grace Mount Priory please see
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/mount-grace-priory/
by Christine Sine
The long awaited day has arrived. Joy has come down, a new world has begun. Yet as I sit here this morning I am very aware of the places where joy still needs to be revealed. It is reflected in my rather unusual nativity scene this year – A Christ candle shining brightly in the middle of an array of animal planters with succulents in them.
Joy to the world – not just me, or you or my neighbors near and far. Not just people past, present and future, but all the world, all the animals, birds and sea creatures, all the insects and spiders and microbes. Today we remind ourselves that joy entered our world as an infant, not fully grown but needing to be nurtured, cared for and protected, needing to be taught and encouraged until he reached full maturity.
As I reflect on this my heart sings, and I do rejoice. God is in the business of making all things new and asks us to care for the small seeds of that newness that we see emerging.
By Kathie Hempel ––
I remember Christmas’ Eves long ago when my sons were very young. Not always fondly.
As a single Mom, with no close family of my own, it was a struggle that I always felt I lost. I wanted to be able to see the boys faces on Christmas morning. I had worked hard to be able to afford at least one thing they really wanted Santa to bring. It just wasn’t enough.
I would imagine that moment they opened the presents and saw they had gotten exactly what they wanted from the Sears Toy Catalog…but then what? What would we do with the other 15 ½ hours of the day?
Sure, I could cook a nice dinner. The four of us could sit around the kitchen table, however, I could not imagine it would feel like Christmas.
Then I would think of their Dad’s family. All the aunts and uncles and cousins, grandma and grandpa, the noise of everyone talking and singing carols and comparing gifts. I could not compete with that. And so, each year regardless of shared custody and the swapping of turns with the children during the holiday, I would pack up their little overnight bags and send them off with their presents for others and wish them the merriest of Christmas’.
Many times, I would collapse against the door after it closed behind them and sob. All I wanted to do was to crawl into bed and sleep until it was over. Just waiting for it to end. Was that all that Christmas had come to mean to me? How I wished for something different!
Today, I look back on those days quite differently. I hope my boys remember Christmas as a happy time. I believe they can, based on all the wonderful stories and laughter that came home from those Christmas’ that were spent with Dad and his family. And I smile, knowing I did the best thing I could for them at the time.
When Christmas doesn’t seem as merry as the televisions commercials tell us it should be, perhaps it is time to look back on that first Christmas Eve. There were no sparkling trees or brightly covered gifts. Just a young man and woman, looking down at a baby they had not conceived together and yet would raise as their own. They were shunned by many they knew and amazed by the remarkable happenings that followed a message from an angel. And now here he was.
He looks so…human. They wonder how exactly does one raise the human son of a Divine God. Shepherds and wise men, angels on high, murder in a King’s heart. There must have been times this very human couple wished for something different.
Yet, based on the hope of the prophets and the voice of the angel, they moved forward. It had to be backbone, not wishbone, that would allow them to complete the extraordinary mission ahead.
Luke 2:19 says: “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.” Is it possible that the secret to our survival of the most difficult times of our lives is contained in this one short verse?
Here is a mother, who counted hope as treasure. How often did she think of all the events that led to that moment? How often did she have to remember, in wonder, the promises of the angel?
Her son was not always easy to understand. He disappeared while they were traveling, it took them three days to find the boy and when they did, he was not exactly apologetic. “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he was saying to them,’ according to Luke 2: 41-52 and again “… his mother treasured all these things in her heart.”
During a wedding she asks for a favor and Jesus at first seems hesitant, she goes to visit him surrounded by crowds of strangers and He asks “who is my mother?” I would not be pleased!
Mary’s toughest time of all comes at the foot of a cross, with mockers tossing lots for her son’s clothes, watching soldiers stab him and offering him vinegar when he desperately needs water. He tells a friend to watch over her and then says, “it is finished.”
Finished? How could that be? An angel said he was going to save the world! That he was a King! She had gone through so much!
These were not, I am quite sure the dreams she had for her babe in the manger. And yet when the day of Pentecost arrives, we find Mary praying with the disciples. Her dreams did not materialize as she had wished, however, her hope obviously persevered.
Hope is what was given that first Christmas. Hope is what sustains us in the tough times, during the longest of long and lonely nights. In hope we remember that the times when the end seems nearest, there is yet the promise of new beginnings.
When the night seems too long, we need to treasure this hope in our hearts and think on these things.
Jeremiah 29:11-13 (NIV)
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
Today’s prayer by African American soul vocalist and musician captures so much of what I long for this Christmas season. The feature image is by Cree artist Jackson Beardy from Winnipeg Mannitoba.
Aaron Neville was born January 24, 1941and died in 2019 at the age of 81. He was an American R&B and soul vocalist and musician with four platinum albums and four Top 10 hits in the United States, including three that went to #1 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart. His debut single, from 1966, was #1 on the Soul chart for five weeks.
By Jeannie Kendall —
Anticipation is a curious thing: and perhaps especially at Christmas. As a child, my favourite part of Christmas was Christmas Eve. I loved the colours of the presents under the tree, and the mystery of which were for who and what they might contain within. If I am ruthlessly honest about those far off days though, often the expectation outshone the reality and I enjoyed the thought of what might be rather than what actually was. My parents made us open presents one at a time each day, eking them out until well past New Year. I never minded, because it lengthened that season of hope of what I might discover hiding under the gaudy exterior.
Sometimes life is like that, with the anticipation superior to the actuality. The holiday which we eagerly await but weather or venue disappoint us. The job we hoped would stretch and develop us which turns out to be monotonously mundane. The friendship for which we hoped more but proved ultimately superficial.
There are many different ways we can respond. We can stop hoping, allowing spider threads of disillusionment to wrap themselves around our soul. Or we can continue to yearn for that moment which will surprise us by finally meeting our unspoken dreams, becoming weary by the waiting. As the Bible puts it, “Unrelenting disappointment leaves you heartsick” (Proverbs 13:12 The Message)
Christmas, it seems to me, is the opposite. At the time of Jesus’ birth, after a 400 year silence from God, surely anticipation had either ceased altogether or become a distant promise retained only by the pious few. And those who hung on had only nationalistic expectations: a warrior Messiah who would crush the Roman oppressors and release the browbeaten Israelites.
Yet the actuality was so much greater. A rescuer not just for the Jews and that limited time, but for every nation and all history and bringing ultimate transformation for the cosmos. Love personified, humanity dignified and restored.
So as Christmas Eve melts into Christmas day, whatever the day itself holds, know that, to quote the next half of that verse from Proverbs, “when desire is fulfilled, it is a tree of life.”. An apt phrase, as, decades later, that tree of death would give us access to full, technicolour life.
For once, as we remember again the Word becoming flesh, the reality far exceeds every expectation.
By Jenneth Graser —
An excerpt from her devotional, Catching the Light
Read Isaiah 42:14, John 3:6, Romans 8:24-25
At certain times in our life, we become aware of the fact that God is preparing to release us into a new season. It feels as though we have come to the moment of birth. God placed a seed of this season in us a while ago; it has been growing for quite some time and now we feel he is about to bring it forth. We can imagine how Mary must have felt, keeping what she was told inside her heart, believing what was promised. The experience she had of meeting Elizabeth when they were both pregnant, released a burst of prophetic praise out of her that revealed the great anticipation she must have felt housing the King of kings in her womb. The preparation for these new seasons is like incubating the life of Jesus in us for a whole new expression and time of his coming in our lives. We become the place of growth as we wait in anticipation for all the good things he has prepared in advance for us. “That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.” (Romans 8:24-25 The Message). It is during these times that we hold onto the life-giving words of Jesus. As we meditate on his promises and inheritance, we become enlarged in the waiting and become more and more ready for the time of “birth”. And when we find ourselves launched out into new things, we continue to rely completely on him and contemplate the wonders of what he has done in our hearts. “Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.” (Luke 2:19).
Thank you Lord, that I am enlarged through the times of waiting for your purposes to be born through me. I will treasure the dreams and visions you give as a sign of what is to come and ponder them with you. I know when the time comes for this season to be born, that nothing can hold it back!
Ready or not, here I come
On the updraft of a dream
Joel paints the picture for you
Visions, all for men and women
Young and old, and it’s coming.
I crescendo off the embankment
Of birth readiness
A waterslide rush headlong
Into new things, new times
New seasons, everything new.
I am the woman of birth readiness
I hold the dreams of my internal child.
Surely “Christ in me” takes on a whole
New meaning; ready or not
Here I come.
I imagine the Christ child living in me
Christ the Man, the Resurrected King
All as much part of me
As I am of him.
I hold up my hands like wings,
Heaven’s basin is my resting place.
All of my prayers resonate with the sound
Of voices, forming incense, now rising
To the ears, voice, nose of the one who loves me so.
As an Amazon Associate, I receive a small amount for purchases made through appropriate links.
Thank you for supporting Godspace in this way.
When referencing or quoting Godspace Light, please be sure to include the Author (Christine Sine unless otherwise noted), the Title of the article or resource, the Source link where appropriate, and ©Godspacelight.com. Thank you!