Book update: Just in case you missed my Instagram story (and by the way - why aren't you following me there? @waitingonwonders )
Fellow Wait-ers!—(drum roll please)
The manuscript is done! Hallelujah!
I'm knee deep in editing, working on cover art, and just shy of two weeks to deadline. So excited to get it in your hands! Keep praying and asking God to use this however He wants to. I can't believe He's taking me on this journey, but so happy to be doing so with you. If you've indicated to me that you're interested in being a part of the launch team - be watching for information about that coming soon - and don't worry, you haven't missed anything quite yet.
Love and appreciate you, fellow Wait-er. Your support means more to me than you can imagine. ♡
And now... Waiting on Wonders - the Christmas Edition:
When You Just Need Jesus To Hold It Together
Today it fell off the table and broke into a million pieces.
I could feel it rising in me. "Seriously??? Of all pieces to break in this nativity set... the baby Jesus!!!???"
It certainly wasn't an expensive trinket, but I had grown fond of it over the years. So I started looking for superglue and analyzing all the pieces to see if a repair was on the horizon.
Attempt one, I glued my fingers together.
Attempt two, I still couldn't make the pieces fit.
Attempt three, with glue-stained fingerprints, I set the ceramic piece upright with a gaping hole in the back.
Maybe?? Nope... (as it crumbled). It wasn't even strong enough to hold up under its own weight. "Come on, baby Jesus - you're the most important part!"
I started looking for options to make it work. I just wanted to help all the pieces fit back together. I just wanted it to be the way it was. I just wanted it to look right. Don't fall apart!
I started laughing. "Come on, Jesus - hold it together!!"
Isn't that it? Sometimes are we just desperate for Jesus to hold it all together? The holidays accentuate the fact that sometimes the pieces just don't all fit back together nicely. Things don't look right. Things seem to fall apart.
We take our mis-glued holiday smiles out of the box once a year, dust them off and hope they polish up nicely on the shelf for the month so we can quietly stuff them back in paper for the next eleven. We position them purposely so that no one sees the gaping hole in the back or notices the repairs and the cracks. Jesus came, however, to fill all the holes and cracks and let us know we don't have to hide them.
Sometimes a "broken Jesus" is just what we need. We need something to remind us that we are not alone.
And while Jesus certainly isn't anything less than perfect, He did come to a cracked and broken world that was completely falling apart at the seams and offered to stretch his arms out and break himself for us so He could hold it all together. When He did, it left scars on His hands. The scars He carries remind us of how He was broken for us and the miracle healing that came to the world because He did.
It's ok to let your breaks show. It's ok to not hide the cracks and the glue and the holes.
I'd rather Him put me back together from shambles, for my good, and experience his fullness in that restoration than be sparkly and perfect and miss the opportunity to know what I've been rescued from. All of that is an opportunity to be reminded of His great love for me. Instead of hiding all the blemishes and breaks and cracks, I want Him to use them as a monument to all He's done and what I've come through with His help.
They are not scars to hide, they are stories to celebrate of His faithfulness.
This Christmas, I'm proudly putting my precious broken nativity figure on display. While Jesus remains my absolutely perfect Savior, this trinket representation of Him reminds me that even in the cracks of my world, He came for me; He came for us all. He is God with us - Emmanuel.
Come, Lord Jesus, hold us all together.
-TB
"And she shall call him Immanuel (meaning, “God is with us”). - Isaiah 7:14 (TLB)