173 Days until Marriage, 10 Days to Christmas...

I think it's fitting that my first blog entry is dated during Advent. This time in my life is one of perpetual waiting, hoping, and looking forward to something and perhaps this is why Christmas, and more specifically, the season of Advent is so tremendously meaningful to me this year. I am a planner and a doer and I now find myself learning how to find JOY in the waiting. Caleb is constantly encouraging me to enjoy our engagement, instead of always distracting myself of thoughts of what is to come, the family we are to have, the home we will live in, what our life will be like then. Now is so precious. Less than six months of away from my entire life changing and I am faced with calming down, breathing, looking around myself and being enraptured with the happiness and excitment, sweetness and rarity of this time.
I have been reading "Two from Galilee" by Marjorie Holmes. In novel form, Holmes tells of the courtship and betrothal of Mary and Joseph. When Caleb and I first got engaged, we got to experience the excitment of sitting down on the floor of my bedroom one night and opening my hope chest. Since I was fifteen, I have been tucking away small treasures. Linens from France that a great aunt passed down, carnival glass and serving bowls that my grandmother gave to me, and a small collection of jadeware that I gathered during high school. Among these were a few letters I had written to my "one-day husband" and a list of books to read during my engagement. "Two from Galilee" was on the list and right after Thanksgiving I began to read. Of course the book is mostly fiction, but the glimpse into Mary's own season of advent has been especially insightful. The wonderment of Jesus' coming, the promise to His people...one of deliverence and hope, justice and mercy, has been exciting to read from Mary's perspective. The line of David for centuries watched and waited for the Messiah to deliver them from political and religious persecution. And then the scene of the Annunciation...Mary is humbled and amazed as she is told by the Messenger of God that she will be the mother of the Hope of Israel. Not only will her child be the Savior to the Jews, but as the Messenger comforts Joseph in his vision, "...she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins." Eternal salvation. Eternal deliverance. Eternal hope.
No doubt that Mary and Joseph's nine month advent was one of great fear and anticipation. But certainly it was also a time of comfort, excitment, and pure wonder! Nine months to await with a sense of awe and rejoicing at what mysteries God would reveal!
Waiting has never seemed so thrilling.