Advent intentions

Last year’s Advent season wasn’t exactly stellar. I mean, it was fine enough. Cookies were baked. The tree was trimmed. Merry was made.

And I had just about nothing to do with it.

Sure, I made the plans. I even nudged things into being by assembling our Advent schedule, putting together craft ideas, reminding Christopher to buy enough butter for the shortbread, and putting holds on our favorite Christmas movies.

But I was on bed rest. And really, there’s only so much jolly to be had while stretched flat on a couch. My memories of Christmas 2012 are all slightly sideways and from knee level. Incidentally, so are the photos.

This year, I was ready to go all out. I trolled pinterest in search of crafts to satisfy the teens and the tots alike. I checked local listings for fun freebies to round out our season. I plotted how to pile everyone in the van late one evening to ooh and ahh at light displays. I sent out invitations to our Open House party. All that was left was my favorite part: assembling a schedule of Scripture readings to explore this season as a family.

It was all coming together so beautifully. I may have even had a moment of insanity when I thought that for once, I was ahead of the game.

Cue the chaos.

Or rather, cue the chicken pox.

Currently, our elevenses (Jack, 11 years, and Simon, 11 months) are both covered in the most textbook chicken pox rash you’ve ever seen. Five year-old John Mark (who was vaccinated, by the way) was actually the one who brought this happy little virus home to us in the first round, and I suspect that round three is just around the corner. The only question, really, is who will be poxed; one of the vaccinated kids (Mary Hannah, 16, and Phineas, 7)? Or just the remaining members of the unvaccinated crew (Mathaus, age 13, and Birdie, 3)?

You can see where this is heading, right? My plans– my well-thought-out, carefully laid, well-meaning plans– well, they’re on the back burner. They may happen … or they may not. I’ve already shuffled some of those Advent activities to allow for getting our Christmas tree later, and frankly, I’ll be surprised if that’s the only set of modifications necessary this year. Because, yeah … sewing a felt ornament is just nowhere near as much fun when you’re itching like crazy. And sad little ones need to be rocked even when the calendar says it’s time to string lights on the tree.

I’d love to say that I took this all with grace. After all, I’m rarely someone who huffs and stews over plans thwarted. I’m just not Type A enough to conjure frustration over that kind of thing. But the fact that I had poured so much into this Advent to somehow make up for last year’s shortcomings, well … let’s just say that while I didn’t stomp and pout physically, my heart was definitely playing the part of the two year-old scorned.

Seriously, God? Advent? After all that cool stuff I had planned? All those things that I so carefully chose to help my family stay focused on You? After last year’s glazed over weeks leading up to Christmas? Chicken pox? Why?

And that’s when it hit me.

The plans I made? The ones I was so sure were about Him?

Well, clearly they weren’t. Not if He chose to toss them in the air and see where they landed the minute a little adversity came my way. Not if my first reaction when He allowed interference was to think I had been doing something for Him.

And that “wasted” season last year?

The one where my older kids picked up the reins and led their younger siblings through the motions of daily living? The one where my husband served tirelessly, folding laundry, cleaning the kitchen, being both Momma and Daddy? The one where I had a seemingly unlimited amount of time to read the nativity story in all its incarnations to my children– both old and young? The one where we humbled ourselves and accepted love and blessing from friends and neighbors?

Maybe that “be still and know that I am God” season was less about us being limited in what we could do and experience and more about us being available to serve and be served.

Maybe this isn’t such a tragedy.

Maybe this is just what God wanted.

Maybe another Advent under the weather is just what we need, after all.