So I don't have pictures to post this time, because I'm not on my school computer. But at least I can post, because I'm not on my school computer! :-)

This Christmas season has been good for me. Sometimes I think that life as a follower of Jesus should be fairly predictable and comfortable. I think He should give me whatever I want, because obviously Fathers want to make their daughters happy. But the Christmas story really struck me this year.

Mary was a young woman with, as my pastor put it, an ordinary life and ordinary dreams of an ordinary husband and family. God stepped into this ordinary life to save the world. However, His good plan did not make Mary comfortable. On the contrary, it tarnished her reputation for life. A young woman, pregnant before her wedding day? This was not something that hometown gossips would ever forgive, forget, or probably even understand. In fact, she could have been stoned to death for the sin everyone supposed she had committed.

Except that God stepped in once more to save the world. He talked to Joseph, who was ready to be as kind as he felt he could be in the circumstances and, rather than having Mary executed, merely leave her to life alone with her child. God told Joseph to marry her. The town gossips would have understood this as an admission of guilt, that Joseph was really the father of Mary's child. Now not only was Mary's reputation tarnished, but Joseph's as well. This is how the world was saved.

Poor Mary could at least have born the last uncomfortable months of her pregnancy in the peace and quiet of her own home. But God arranged so that a census was called and she had to travel with Joseph to register in Bethlehem. No matter whether she walked or rode a donkey, this would not have been an easy trip. And that is how God saved the world.

The baby King of the Universe was born in a stable because there were no rooms left in the hotel. His earthly parents couldn't afford nice clothes for him, so they wrapped him in rags to keep him warm. For attendants he had shepherds, a rough, ill-behaved lot who were deemed to low for decent company. This is how the world was saved.

Eight days after he was born, Mary and Joseph took the baby Messiah to the temple. The Jews had been waiting, longing, and praying for a Savior for centuries. They probably pictured a great war hero who would ride in on a charging stallion, rally their people around him, and drive the Romans out of Israel.

Two broken-down, old servants of God were waiting in the temple, waiting for a glimpse of the Messiah. They probably had the same expectations as the rest of their countrymen. But there was a difference as well - they had the Spirit of God in their hearts. When Jesus and His earthly parents arrived at the temple, Simeon came to greet them. God's Spirit told him that this unlikely little baby, born to parents so poor that they could afford only two birds for the sacrifice, was the Savior he had been waiting to see. He recognized that this was how the world was to be saved.

While he was speaking, Anna came up. She was a beautiful old woman who had lived a hard life because she had survived her husband for so many years. She was probably very poor and undervalued. But she dedicated herself to God, and she listened to His Spirit. So when the Child came to the temple she recognized Him as the One who would save the world, and told others about Him.

Sometimes I come up with plans about how God should save the world. More often I come up with selfish ways He could make me happy. But His redemption story has never rested on the comfort of His people. He has broken expectations and surpassed dreams. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts" (Is. 55:9). God, give me eyes through the Spirit to see your answers when they don't look like I expect.