O that we would have eyes to see the beauty within each other’s eyes and know the longing within each other’s sighs.

O that we would have eyes to see the One who has no form within each other, until what is a mystery or lacking meaning, with new eyes would see and know this Advent, this Mystery of Christmas: a Baby born of a Virgin.

O that we would have hearts of understanding, that although this man, Jesus, was not to live in a body so beautiful that people would be drawn to Him, but by His inner beauty people would follow, so within all that the world might distort as uncomely, or cruel or insignificant could be transformed by this: His Beautiful countenance.

Can our hearts rest here? In a world torn asunder?

The Christmas story comes to us through the yearnings within us to know how deep and wide and high this love is that came down to us. “I have come down from heaven.” It’s there in John 6, six times.

Through the Mystery of His Spirit coming down, coming into us, we see, it’s through His suffering that He comes to us through our own suffering.

O that we would see anew that it’s because the world is broken that He came. We can become beautiful because He was broken…?

He is waiting to come again. How patient He is. He must long to come, long to comfort, long to see us become who we were meant to be.

So we prepare our hearts. Because faith is found by the fallen. Faith becomes known within the longings and sorrows and sufferings of the broken-hearted.

This Beauty is not ours to create.

The coming, the waiting, the becoming, the returning of the Son, the One conceived in Mystery, came, lived, died and rose again—miracle upon miracle upon the miracle yet to come—is our becoming. Transforming all that’s broken into everlasting glory.

And yet, this Beauty unseen is alive within us now. God in us.

Immanuel.

The Word of God in us is at work, making our inner countenance like His. Gentle and lowly. Holy. And Beautiful.

Pondering Advent. Isaiah 53:2. Adapted from my Advent Calendar 2019.