Every year, during the holiday season, as we approach Christmas, the events increase and things get crazier. This last week was nuts. In the midst of an atmospheric river of rainfall, we had to procure outfits for the kids for a middle school dance and choir performance. There was also a birthday gift to shop for while still making sure the regular dinners and school lunches and laundry also happened. How are we out of socks again? And work, Tim and I also have real-world jobs. It’s all so much. 

Everything culminated on this weekend with the dance on Friday, dress rehearsal on Saturday and the choir performance and family birthday on Sunday. We were hitting all the miles stones, but there were also cracks showing. I burnt a pot rice and melted my favorite mixing bowl in the kitchen while in the living room, our bored dog chewed up the new couch covers. “No Oreo, no!”

Sunday morning, we attended both choir performances. I cried as I watched a young girl on stage light the pink advent candle representing joy. Then we took our youngest to a party where her cousin blew out her birthday candles. Tim and I walked through the Christmas light display at the Grotto, gleaming with racks of candles representing hundreds of Portlanders’ prayers. Across the world people, there are more lit candles for loved ones lost to violence on first night of Hanukkah, the festival of lights. 

On these damp, dark nights, humanity is lighting candles to remember our past, celebrate our present and demonstrate flickering hope for the future. 

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:5