This is one of my favorite times of year. Not because I get all kinds of presents. That’s fun. I get to give presents. I get to make presents. And people seem to be in a good mood for the season. The music is fun. The decorations are awesome. Hallmark movies are cheesy and happy and fun.

I get together with some girls and my moms and we bake dozens of cookies.

I gather all of the random fabric remnants I’ve bought over the year and scour Pinterest for easy gifts to sew.

I gather all of the random skeins of yarn that I’ve bought over the past year and figure out what I can make for whom.

And the crafting gets crazy. (I actually started in October this year… instead of November like last year.)

I think about what the next year might look like. My planner pages are almost ready to go for January.

And the food! And the Christmasy coffees, cocoas, and teas!

But the best part about it all, for me, is the time that the season gives me to contemplate the birth of Jesus.

People who follow the Christian calendar (also known as the liturgical calendar) call this time of year Advent.

It’s the anticipating of the birth of Jesus, the looking forward to, the re-connecting with the purpose for His coming.

And while I don’t necessarily follow the Christian calendar, it is a good time of year to think about it all.

I like to read the different parts of the Old Testament that point to the coming of the Messiah. And I read the parts of the New Testament that tell about his birth.

So during this Christmas season, or Advent season, or however you wish to call it, I’ll be posting some of the things that I like to read and I’ll be sharing some of my contemplations here with you.

I’ll start here, with this verse from John 1:

¹⁴ So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son.

Every time I read this verse, I can’t help but think about how thankful I am to have taken all those Biblical Greek classes in college.  Really, there were only 3 classes, but I loved them so much and learning Greek opened up a whole new world for me.  I could talk and talk and talk about how much I love Greek.  But I think I might bore y’all.

So I’ll just share this little tidbit I picked up from my first lessons on the Greek in John 1.  The Greek word that is translated to “made his home” or if you’re a fan of the KJV “dwelt” could also be translated as “pitched his tent”.

And that just paints a word picture in my mind.  Not just that I’ve done a lot of camping in my time.  It’s more than that.

It reminds me of the story of the children of Israel after they left Egypt.  God delivered them using Moses and Aaron and 10 plagues.  Check out the book of Exodus for more details.

Then all of these descendants of Jacob (also known as Israel, so they’re called Israelites) are led by God via Moses across the Red Sea and into the desert.  And they lived there in tents.  And due to all kinds of choices, they spent 40 years there wandering around in the desert.

During their camping in the desert, God gives Moses a plan for a tabernacle–a tent–just for him, for God.  And God doesn’t skimp on details.  He tells them exactly how he wants all of the furniture and the curtains and altars and everything.

And that’s God’s tent.  That’s where the people can see the cloud or the pillar of fire that God uses as the visible manifestations of his presence.

God pitched his tent right there with his people in the wilderness.

And when they packed up their tents to move to another place, they packed up God’s tent and moved it with them, too.

God could have just left them on their own when they proved to be so stuck in their complaining or sinning or stubbornness.

He could have let them go back to Egypt.

But he didn’t.

He had them put together his tent.  He wanted them to see more than just a cloud or a pillar of fire.  Those aren’t exactly permanent.  But a tent…to a bunch of desert-dwellers, living in tents, on the move and heading for the Promised Land…the tent was like God saying, “I’m right here in this with you.  You’ve screwed up, but I’m not going anywhere.  I’m going to set up camp right here with you in my tent.

And that’s what he did when he came as a baby.

He didn’t have to.

He could have said, “Y’all are so screwed up.  I’m just going to let you wallow in the consequences of your choices.  Forget you!”

But he didn’t.  He put on human skin.  That’s even riskier than pitching a tent with a bunch of people and living with them in the desert for 40 years.

He’s God and he became a baby–a human baby.

That’s some serious tent-pitching right there.  He didn’t have to do that.  But he did.

He loves us that much.

Doesn’t that just give you goosebumps?!