When Love Shows Up: From Hospital Rooms to Bethlehem

The kids sat in the back seat of the van and giggled in a merry-go-round of silliness while my brain raced. Was I having a heart attack? The left side of my chest felt tight, my breathing shallowed.

Should I drive the emergency room? My husband was out of town. Who would watch the kids? I thought about my aunts and uncles with heart disease, and my mom, who died of a stroke.

“Hey, guys, Mom is driving to the emergency room just to make sure I’m okay.”

When I sat down in the hospital waiting room, I texted the ladies in my Sunday school class to pray. One friend replied, “Where are you?”

Then she came.

She checked in with me, took the kids to McDonald’s, and stayed with them for hours at home while doctors poked for blood and stuck leads on my torso to monitor my heart. It turned out, I wasn’t having a heart attack. Stress and exhaustion were to blame.

I came home to happy, safe kids. And I thanked God for my friend who embodied God’s love by showing up.

In a much bigger way, the Christmas season is a time to pause in gratitude for Jesus, God himself showing up to meet our greatest need. We need much more than childcare; we need salvation and redemption.

And Jesus came.

God, who made the cosmos (Gen 1; Isa 45:18); who chose Abram’s line to become his people and walked with the Israelites through cloud by day and pillar by night (Exod); who established the Law and sent the prophets to proclaim about the time to come, when the Messiah would appear (Isa 53)—this God came as a baby through Mary’s virgin womb (Luke 1:26–38).

The infinite put on finite form. Holy is his name.

One of the many mysterious aspects of Jesus’s arrival is that oxygen first filled his lungs in a place where animals slept and birthed their young. Immanuel, God with Us (Matt 1:23), arrived in a messy place—and he still enters our messiness.

He arrives in the messiness of our sin when his Spirit draws us back to him. God doesn’t look for a perfectly swept house or an overflowing bank account; he shows up by his Spirit and shows us the way in our weakness and imperfection (John 14:6).

Like my friend showed up—with a quick word, at a moment’s notice.

This Christmas season, let’s show up as well. Let’s gift others our presence. Maybe it means being fully present in conversations with loved ones you haven’t seen in a while. Maybe it means volunteering, donating, or baking gingerbread to share with neighbors.

However we celebrate, let’s show up like God showed up for us.

Reflect:

• When is a time someone showed up for you? How did their presence minister to you in a time of need?
• Who might need someone to show up for them right now? How might you be able to enter into their need?

Prayer:

Heavenly Father, thank you for the times I needed kindness, and you provided through others. Amidst all the rush of this season, open my eyes to show up in kindness to others like you showed up for us the first Christmas. In Jesus’s name I pray, amen.

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For more devotionals in this series, see:
Article "The Unexpected Messiah"
Devotional #2 “Discovering the Hope of Christmas in Genesis”
Devotional #3 “The Gift We’re Still Waiting For”