The first snow of the season welcomed the last month of an incredible year. Its beauty made our little part of the world look clean and pure, hopeful even.

Driving home in the early darkness the last several weeks, I notice houses decorated well before December 1. A week before Thanksgiving, one of my piano students excitedly told me that her family was decorating the Christmas tree that very night. Lights shine from windows and brightly decorated living rooms are showcased on social media.

Is it possible we all need a little Christmas, right this very minute, candles in the window and carols at the spinet?

We’ve endured difficult confinements, weekly changing regulations of how we live, do business and attend church and family gatherings. Teachers had to learn new ways to reach their students through computer screens while parents act as surrogate instructors and work from home too.

It has been challenging to say the least. I need peace on earth and goodwill toward all people. I need Christmas.

And then I think of the first Christmas, the very beginning of the reason for this season.

In a small village, a young girl found herself pregnant, and the angel-visited-and-now-I’m–with-child-story she told is outlandish. A virgin birth? Who can believe such a tale? Certainly not her parents, her neighbors or her betrothed. Her life was in danger since the man to whom she was pledged prepared to divorce her privately, taking no responsibility for this so-called miraculous conception. His honor was at stake, the reputation he had built and protected.

The place and the time of this old story were fraught with problems for the people of the living God in the land of Judah. Regulations changed without warning, harsh rulers cared little for man, woman or child. Taxes were unreasonable and only got worse. Scratching out a living just to survive was their way of life.

When Joseph took Mary as his wife, they traveled a long, hard journey on foot. They found no lodging upon arriving at Bethlehem. A dark, damp cave provided shelter. Possibly no midwife attended Mary, with Joseph her only help in birthing her first born.

Perhaps like me, these thousands of years later, they needed a little Christmas. And He came, tiny and helpless, crying for comfort and a mother’s milk. It seemed a strange way to save the world.

It still does. And yet it is the way of a loving God, come to the wanderers, the lost and dying, the confused and tired. He came to turn an upside down world right side up.

It doesn’t look like the world is right side up. The work is not completed. The children of the living God still struggle but with the presence of the Holy Spirit. Life is hard but not without hope. Death comes but with the promise of resurrection.

Jesus said there would be troubled times until He comes the second time. When He returns it will not be as helpless infant but as King of kings, Lord of lords. The Lion of the tribe of Judah will roar with power and authority. He will make all things right.

And we will sing Joy to the World, the Lord has come!