Joy to the World, the Lord has come, let earth receive her King…
…Let every heart prepare Him room.
Just like His entrance into the world in a manger, He isn’t looking for pomp and circumstance. He doesn’t need a parade; He just wants room in your heart. He wants to fill you to capacity with all He has to offer instead of watch you try to fill yourself with what the world offers. Every year we celebrate advent with a million little traditions. Each year I try to wrap a significant phrase or word into our advent season. I am a little nerdy with words. The picture I’m getting this year is preparing room. There are a lot of individual hearts under my roof. I have one who just started middle school and one in Kindergarten. I don’t want to take away any of the traditions we share of celebrating this season together, but as my children grow older their faith needs to expand as well. My heart needs expansion too. So, I am challenging us to pray about preparing room. We are going to ask God to make us ready for His coming, and we are going to wait with expectant hearts to see what He brings this season.
Preparation is so important. Every good event I’ve ever hosted took time to plan. Things that we don’t plan don’t often happen. So, in planning for Advent we are going to all do two things, sit still and listen. These are really hard for our culture and they can be especially hard for children. Don’t get me wrong, we sit a lot, but our minds and hearts aren’t ever still. We aren’t formally going to sit together and stare at the wall, we are just going to talk about being still in the moments God gives us. We are going to talk about it at breakfast and dinner. I have learned that kids come up with the greatest ideas! Tap into them!
What does preparing Him room in your heart look like? For me it’s getting up extra early to sit under the Christmas lights in the stillness. Maybe it means you take your Bible in the school pick up line instead of Instagram. Try several things, do them all, but don’t let this season pass without making room for Him to sit with your heart and tell you all the things you need to know about this past year and the one to come. Only He knows what it will truly hold. Prepare room for Him so that it doesn’t get filled with useless things. I didn’t give you answers for how to prepare room for God in your family this season on purpose. This is a call to individualize Christmas. It’s a challenge to pray over every heart in your home to expand and make room for Jesus coming. I really believe that the more space we free up for Him to occupy, the more He will blow our expectations.
Whatever it looks like in your heart and home, make room for Him this season, and then let that opened space be filled with more of Him so that the next season is affected. Let His coming open an avenue of abundance wherever you need to feel His abundance.
Lauren Mitchell
CHM Contributor
