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Hello Reader,

Happy December! Anyone else feel like some months in 2024 were the longest months ever, while other months flew by so fast? January felt like an eternity, and yet I'm struggling to process how now we are less than three weeks from Christmas.

As I think about Advent and the Christmas season all manner of expectations begin to swell up. Perhaps you have had holidays in the past where the expectation of how the event was to happen and the reality of how the event went were very different.

In the early years of our marriage, after our first child was born, my husband and I traveled over seas to visit my family for Christmas one year. We packed up diapers, gifts, and all the things. Christmas morning, presents were opened up and our son was playing with toys, when it dawned on my husband I hadn't opened a present from him! He was so remorseful for forgetting to get me a present.

We joke about the event now, but at the time I remember thinking, "Well that's not how I expected Christmas morning to go."

(Now don't worry, he more than made up for the error and has never failed a Christmas since. Lesson learned for sure!)

The reality of the advent season is that Christmas isn't always what we expect. As a matter of fact, Mary was quite familiar with living out the unexpected. Never in a million years did this young woman from Israel imagine an angel would interrupt her life and announce she was tasked with mothering the Messiah, or that she would be a virgin when she delivered her firstborn, or that the delivery of the King of Kings would take place with an audience of animals and then celebrated by shepherds.

It's very likely Mary expected a traditional Jewish wedding celebration to Joseph and not the gossip and whispers of people in town. She likely expected to raise a gaggle of kids in their hometown while Joseph built up his business, not having to travel to Egypt to protect the life of her son from a lunatic king.

Mary was no stranger to unmet expectations. This should bring us great comfort.

No where in her diary did she write entries about how wonderful it would be to have a surprise and physically impossible pregnancy, raise a perfect human only to watch him be ridiculed, suffer and crucified and then suddenly resurrect and leave earth to go back to heaven. If there was ever a woman who had to learn to live well in reality and lay aside expectations it was Mary.

When things don't play out as we expect, or when reality doesn't match our desires, it can be easy to get derailed in discouragement or discontentment. We can fuss and fight against our reality, or we can recalibrate our expectations.

Mary knew how to lay down her expectations and enter into the story God had. I love her response to the angel Gabriel when she was presented with the assignment to be the mother to Jesus. In that moment Mary laid aside any desires or expectations she had of how her life would go and said,

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​“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. -Luke 1:38

Mary stepped into the unexpected and embraced the raw, messy, beautiful reality before her.

I have no idea what this holiday season holds. None of us do. We can either fight against anxiety and elevated expectations, or we can walk forward, releasing expectations and living grateful, surrendered lives to the reality God writes before us.

Things don't have to look perfect this Christmas. The world won't end if the wrapping paper doesn't match or the house isn't perfect before the party. Lay down the expectations and just embrace the beauty of what is before you this advent season.

Father, I release to You my expectations of what I think this month needs to look like. Help me to walk through these days with gratitude and with eyes that see You at work all around me. Thank You for this beautiful reminder of Your great love for us that You would interrupt human history and send Jesus for us. In the name of Jesus and by the power of the Spirit I pray, amen.

In His Grace,

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Need a reading plan for the advent season?

Read one chapter of the book of Luke each day in the month of December and you can read the entire story of Jesus this month.

Looking to get holiday shopping done easily?

Swing by the Girlfriends in the Word™ store and order and ship out your gifts with just a few clicks.

​ Natalia Drumm is a wife, homeschooling mother to three boys, and graduate from Dallas Theological Seminary with a passion for women's ministry and sharing the Gospel. Seeking to glorify God through equipping women to study Scripture and grow in their faith, she is the creator of Girlfriends in the Word™ Bible studies for busy women. To learn more, or connect with her online you can find her on Instagram @nataliadrumm or check out her website www.nataliadrumm.com​

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