My writing began with Christmas. Let me explain.
After graduating from college with a B.F.A. in Creative Writing, I struggled to find a job and my place in the writing world, so I started working the midnight shift at a factory making airplane parts. As I waited for my press to run its cycle, I’d daydream all sorts of stories, jotting down ideas on scraps of paper. As December drew near, Christmas came closer to me than ever before.
My first Christmas story was born on the hard, slippery surface of a press in December 1996, and so began my tradition of writing a short story for the occasion every year. But my heart longed to DO something with my Christmas stories. I wanted to make a difference.
Years later, I recruited my sweet hubby and a few kindhearted friends to hand out copies of my story in exchange for a donation we could give to a local charity. Oh, how I loved that feeling of giving.
Yet, I wanted more. More Christmas? More writing? More giving?
Yes, but-
I wanted more understanding. Why Christmas, Lord? As a Christian I understood the miracle of Jesus’ birth and the reason He came, but why had I been so captivated by writing Christmas stories? (I don’t mean tales about the jolly guy in the red suit.)
After praying, waiting, and searching the Scriptures, God wove the threads of His answer together in a powerful epiphany: Christmas is an overlapping of the supernatural with the natural. Think about it. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was miraculously born of a virgin, left heaven to enter our world to redeem us from our sins. Angels suddenly appeared, filling the night sky before trembling shepherds, who stood in shock. God instructed Joseph through dreams, and the Magi were rerouted through one as well. The supernatural acts of Almighty God overlapped the everyday stuff. Both the ordinary and extraordinary happened simultaneously, leaving us so awestruck (and eternally grateful, of course!) that we’re still talking about the event today!
And doesn’t God rescue us and move in miraculous ways today? Doesn’t He still speak in dreams to guide and warn us, and don’t angels continue their visitations? Don’t our hearts tremble as we long for more of something we can’t reach or fully understand, a glimpse of heaven, a touch from the One who left it all behind for us?
God not only programmed eternity in our hearts but He’s instructed us to think about heaven!
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11 NIV.)
Thinking of heaven and not being able to grasp what God has done is exciting!! It’s like preparing for a trip you KNOW you’re taking, wondering with hopeful expectations what the destination will be like, and understanding your wildest dreams won’t just pale in comparison but won’t even belong in the same color palette! Oh, the anticipation of going home just keeps building!
It’s in my anticipation and homesickness that I’m not only thinking about heavenly things, but I’m also writing about them. One miracle. One angel. One prepared heavenly room at a time. It’s God overlapping supernaturally in our natural, ordinary world. Today. Now. For you and me.
Need a few examples of what that might look like? Check out these short stories:
Of course, these short stories are fictitious and only two are Christmas-themed, but they’re grounded in God’s promises and the hope we have in the unseen, where my eyes are fixed.
“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Corinthians 4:18 NIV.)
You see, dear reader, I’m gazing at our future, heavenly home with Jesus and enjoying the possibility of the miraculous and supernatural things Almighty God could do along our way home. Sometimes there will be Christmas. Sometimes there won’t. But there will always be hope.
Won’t you join me?
Joey Rudder 