Just a touch of hope

   It's Christmas Eve, just after 8:00pm. A mother huddles with her children around an open stove, which is the only source of heat in their small, empty apartment. It doesn't feel like Christmas Eve to them. As far as they can see, it's been just another day in a long line of days they have gone through with very little to eat, if anything at all.
   During this entire week, they had walked the streets past colorful Christmas displays in store windows. They'd seen happy, well fed families wearing beautiful clothes, strolling down the sidewalks with smiles on their faces and joy in their hearts. After all, the spirit of Christmas was everywhere.
   They'd heard people talk about Jesus being born on this day, Christmas gifts, delicious Christmas dinners and even how Santa Claus was to visit every home and leave beautiful gifts under their Christmas tree.
   But they have no Christmas tree, they have no Christmas dinner, and they have no reason to feel hope or joy in anything. All they have is each other. They stay up as late as they can, huddled around the stove, then go to bed hungry, all of them laying on a single mattress, huddled close to stay warm through the night.
   When morning arrives, their mother gets them dressed, and takes them to church. After all, you almost have to go to church on Christmas morning, don't you? That's just what people do.
   They sit in church and listen to the pastor preach about the joy and hope of Christmas. and how Jesus is the center of that joy and hope. But his seemingly empty words fall softly to the ground for these small children because they've never had the experience of feeling the joy of having any of their hopes fulfilled. To them, Christmas holds no extraordinary sense of joy or hope. It's just another day, full of hunger and cold dispair.
   They leave the church and walk home, planning to spend the day in their empty apartment. As they open the front door, they can't believe their eyes. In the middle of their living room, there now stands a big Christmas tree, loaded with lights and tinsel. Under the tree are gifts for all of the children. The children squeal with excitement as they run toward the tree. Their mother, stunned by this unexpected development, stands in the doorway and scans the room. Her gaze becomes fixed on the kitchen counter, where someone had placed a beautiful Christmas dinner with all the trimmings.
   In that very moment, with the blink of an eye, an entire family suddenly believes in joy. They believe in hope. They believe that the words spoken by the pastor that Sunday morning can actually become true. They weren't just words after all.
   This is not a fictional story. This is a true story that happened in the life of a dear friend of mine back in the late 1960's. As she tells it, the nuns from their local church had learned about their situation, and asked the landlord to let them into the apartment while her family was at church so they could leave them..............hope. As it turns out, all of these children, now grown adults, are mature Christians who all involved in their local churches.
   This past Sunday, Pastor Len talked about having "Extra Ordinary Hope." He talked about Mary and Joseph, and the hope they were given with the birth of Jesus. That hope encouraged them to go above and beyond what might be expected of anyone to accomplish great things that we read about to this very day. But it all began with faith, hope, and love.
   I would ask all of you to look around during this week before Christmas, and find someone, anyone, who might be given a sense of this "Extra Ordinary Hope" from just one small gesture of kindness. It doesn't have to be anything as elaborate as what my friend and her family experienced. Maybe it's something as small as a phone call, a word of encouragement, or even setting another place at the table to invite someone who will otherwise spend this Christmas alone. It might just give that person the very sense of hope they needed at that very moment, and we have no idea how far God can take just a sliver of hope.

Merry Christmas to all