the true message of Christmas
A few years back, on Christmas Eve, we started have issues with our plumbing. The kitchen sink was making a “glugging” sound and when I ran a load of laundry, the water started coming up the kitchen sink.
We spent a couple hours trying to figure out the problem between the kitchen and the laundry room but couldn’t find anything. Then, across the house, our son yells, “Why is the living room carpet wet?!”
That led us to the leak. It seems our pipes were backed up all the way to the point where they exited the house. There was a small overflow valve and it was overflowing for sure – all over our living room floor. So, at 5PM on Christmas Eve, instead of sitting down to a cozy dinner by candlelight, we were pulling back carpet, finding as many fans as possible, and praying that the pipe snake that my husband owned once upon a time still existed in the garage.
By midnight the clog was cleared and we were on our way to flood recovery. Side note and huge praise: this clog only consisted of kitchen and laundry drainage and NOT from any bathroom! That could have made clean-up look a bit differently. However, that night, instead of falling asleep to visions of sugar plums, we fell asleep to loud roars of 5 box fans and the funky, damp smell of carpet.
Christmas Day was spent celebrating Jesus and also navigating the large mess in our living room as everything was displaced as the carpet dried out.
I chuckled to myself as I poured my cup of coffee Christmas morning. At first, the message on the mug felt like it was mocking me. But then, I took it as a gentle reminder.
I am a recovering perfectionist and take great comfort and joy when things are in order. I found it quite fitting (and a heart lesson for me!) that the day we set aside to celebrate our Savior’s appearance on Earth was also a day that I needed to be reminded of my own messiness in my life.
Because Jesus didn’t come to save the perfect, the put together, and the good. He came to rescue the messy, the hurting, and the lost.
And that’s exactly what I am.
We can take comfort and joy in the lovely order of things, but we can also rejoice with just as much enthusiasm, if not more, in the middle of our messy. Because that is EXACTLY where Jesus meets us. 
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