You, you, God thinks about you.
God was thinking of you long before your debut.
From the very beginning, amid history and time,
you, little one, never left God’s mind.
– from Matthew Paul Turner’s “When God Made You”

What brings you hope?
Is it biblical stories and prophecies?
Some internal sense that things are going to be okay?
The promise that the grand arc of the universe may be long but that it bends toward justice?

One of the things that constantly amazes me about humanity is our capacity for hope. In the darkest of times, the human spirit flares up and shines. There’s something in humanity that just can’t be defeated— something special, something enduring. And that spirit seems strange and remarkable given how brief a time humanity has existed and how small a pocket of space we occupy by comparison to the grand scale of the universe.

I often wonder if our indomitable spirit has more to do with the hands which shaped us— a God who crafted literally billions of planets and has ruled over time for longer than it has existed and yet knows each and every detail about us. There’s hope in the fact that the grand shaper and sustainer of the cosmos is also a friend by our side and a spirit moving within us.

Around this time of year, we remember that God —the God who creates and drives the stars themselves, who governs the tides, who crashes tectonic plates to make mountain ranges, who weaves together DNA for every individual blade of grass and personally fashions every drop of dew— that same God takes an intimate interest in us. That same God longed to dwell with us, to work alongside us, to be one of us and one with us.

When that God is a friend,
even in the most tempestuous of times,
even amid the greatest uncertainty and conflict,
how can we not find some glimmer of hope?

This year’s Advent posts each begin with an excerpt from Matthew Paul Turner’s exceptional children’s book “When God Made You.” It’s one of my daughter’s favorites, and it’s a great reminder for adults as well. It’s pretty much a perfect stocking stuffer for all ages. Also, the image at the top of each post this year is Jessi’s and my own Advent wreath in our home, so know that we’re lighting the candles with you as these posts go live.