Just before 8:00 this morning, JT leaned over the railing of his hospital bed and said, “Merry Christmas Daddy!”  I heard myself playing the part of the sleepy parent as if it were scripted for me, “Just a little more sleep, buddy.  Go back to sleep for a just a couple more minutes…”  And God bless him, he was quiet until about 9:00.  That’s when Jodi burst into the room with a Santa hat on her head and rousted us out – I tried the same line on her but she was not put off so easily. 

It was wonderful.  She had a little tree and JT’s stocking and a wagonload of wrapped presents hid in the parent’s lounge.  So he and I went for a stroll down the deserted hallway of the Day Hospital while she got busy.  Needless to say, when we arrived back at Room 21, it looked like the Ghost of Christmas Present had paid a visit…tree, gifts, stocking, laughter – sweet.  The nurses kept poking their heads in and watching through the window as JT opened gifts, shouted, and jumped around.  The timing couldn’t be better – it’s Christmas day and he’s finally feeling well enough to celebrate properly.

It was a day for being pensive too.  It’s Christmas after all, when Jesus came as a child to give us a glimpse of the kingdom, of eternal life, of the not-yet when by his blood “all things sad will come untrue.”  And Jacob Treebeard, this delightful boy saved for this life by his donor’s free gift of blood and bone marrow…he’s given me another glimpse of how it will be in the kingdom.  I’m not getting the words quite right here but if you could see the ornament Jodi made for our Christmas tree, the one with the picture of the donor’s bone marrow before the transplant, and then you saw Jacob’s beautiful smiling picture on an adjacent ornament, and you could see it all in the context of the larger celebration of Jesus’ birth at Christmas, maybe it would make sense.

Thanks to all of you who continue to pray that this good work of healing will be brought to completion.  I hope that you who read this will know Big Life in new and powerful ways this season, will be blessed by Love as we have been blessed.  Merry Christmas!