Old New Story.

Watching our granddaughter grow is one of the most stirring things I have ever experienced. The through line of life from my bride to our son and his bride to their daughter is an expansive relational opening that is so cavernous, it doesn't feel like I'll ever finish mining it. When I ask her a question and I see her eyes look at me roaming through trillions of synapses firing in that second, I am mesmerized as she is literally growing and forming in that moment.

The season of Advent has familiar pathways for our family. There are certain things that we have chosen to do over years and years that are a part of the fabric of these 4 weeks each year. This is no declaration of sustained excitement or interest over decades of this path. Just that we have chosen to be on these paths. One of those pathways is using something called a Jesse Advent Tree. The simple description is this. The 25 days from December 1st to Christmas Day are used, one day at a time, to tell the story of God from creation to Christ child. Our particular version involves a small colored-paper ornament with a ribbon through it, each one telling part of the Story from Creation to Kinsman Redeemer to Josiah to the root of Jesse to the arrival of God's Son on our earth. A number of candles are lit corresponding to the number of the day in December we happen to be on and the little, ribboned ornament is hung on a small tree as Scripture is heard and that part of the Story is recounted. This Damon and Lea and our three sons have heard these same stories, this same way, for decades.

It's a beautiful old Story. It has roamed in our family these years with varied response, from wonder to seeming waste of time and everything in between. We keep retelling the same old Story each Advent whether it lifts us to intrigue or lulls us to sleep.

Over these past weeks of this current Advent, the old Story is new. Our granddaughter spent a string of days with us. We played trains. We saw trains. We pulled Lea's original Fisher Price school bus round and round Beacon Hall. We read. We laughed. We cried. And each day we anticipated telling that days old Story around the dinner table with the Jesse tree. Each little paper ornament is tucked in a box with numbered doors to hold it until it's ready for its day. Our granddaughter opened doors 9, 10, 11, and 12 while she was here. We told the stories for each ornament. She kept saying "9,9,9,9." She remembered what she was doing each night. She opened the little door each night and got out that days ornament. She got to put each one on the little tree. Each night she pointed to the ones that she knew she had put on the nights before. She was telling us the old Story new again. New ears are hearing the old Story now. That is so humbling for me to consider. She is getting her chance to hear. How is it impacting me that she is getting to hear the Story? That is so refreshing for me to consider. How will Ruth, Josiah, Jesse and Jesus impact her life?

Oh, that season of Advent. A season of preparation and waiting.

Jesus, are You weaving Your through line in her? Will she be used to weave it into a son or daughter? A grandchild?

She is showing her Patch that the old Story is new today.

That must mean....

There's more.