Delivering Christmas Gifts to BC Children's Hospital

Gemma and her parents, a family we've gotten to know!

Something you gotta know right off the top: I have a pretty amazing family.

For the last couple of years, our family has been purchasing gifts in memory of Josiah which we donate to BC Children's Hospital. This is something Marie and I have done on our own (as well as providing a gift at Josiah's birthday) and our extended family has picked up on it as well. This year we added a second gift in memory of my dad who also gave to BC Children's during - and after - his grandson's time there.

Our niece - ever the entrepreneur at the age of six - has been finding creative ways to buy gifts for the children who are hospital-bound during the Christmas season. This summer she started raising chickens on the farm, collecting and selling the eggs, and then using the money to buy gifts for kids.

Wow. Just wow.

This past Monday Marie and I (with the help of our Aunt Chrystal and our cousins Rachel and Denver) delivered gifts to BC Children's Hospital. It was a good and sad thing. A few familiar faces, lots of familiar sounds and smells that bring back so many memories.

Marie and I have learned to brace ourselves for our inevitable responses that come from returning to the hospital: irritability, solemness, echoes of past anxieties, and alike. We warn each other about how we might respond, try to be gracious with each other and be quick to forgive when we lash out. Some days we do better than others.

Return visits have not become any easier, but they are fewer now since now we only return to bring gifts. The families we got to know have all been discharged - praise God! - yet there are a few staff members that we consider friends and try to remain connected with.

As difficult as it is - and it may sound odd to others who also grieve - but we have found meaning and healing by 'forcing' ourselves to keep BC Children's as a part of our seasonal rhythm. A part of stepping forward - for us at least - is to maintain 'markers' and traditions throughout the year that remind us of our son and what God has led us through. But keeping links to our past - thus, as a result, re-entering the grief and the pain each time - we move forward with hearts that are heavier but healthier. This may not be how all people grieve, but this has been our experience.

To all those who are - out of consideration for our grief - praying for our family this Christmas, we give you our humble and sincere thanks. There is much I am dreading as Christmas Day approaches. Yet, I am reminded that Christ's birth points us to his return, and so I lift my gaze forward to anticipate our Savior's next coming when all will be made new.

Hope and Comfort, Grace and Peace.
- Andrew

Not Feeling Christmasy at Christmas Time

via Flickr

Misery loves company, as the saying goes.

With Advent upon us and Christmas accelerating towards us, I am again drawn to the sad and lowly and tragic parts of the Christmas story. I caught myself doing this when Josiah died and I'm on that same path again this season.

Christmas and sorrow. They go together more likely than we think. Most of our holiday rhythms have drubbed out any hint of sadness, for it is after all supposed to be the season of perpetual joy. And so we put on a seasonal sheen to fit in and a festive glow is projected in all that we do. We cloak ourselves with holiday goodwill and merriment, and yet within, our souls are aching and the Christmas season is just making it worse.

Loneliness. Pain. Heartbreak. Grief. Shame.

Christmas sometimes comes at the worst time of the year.

And yet, it is the story of God coming to us. To us. It is the beginning of the slow renewal of the world. It marks the return of God being with man for the first time since He walked in the garden with His creation.

God chooses to be with us.

In sadness. In sorrow. In suffering. God comes.

To suffer with us. To suffer for us.

This is Christmas.

... Advent is not just remembering how the world waited for the coming of the Messiah, but how we still wait for His coming. It is a time to embrace the ache of our lovesick hearts, to rejoice in our hunger pains, to survey the broken mess of our world and know that, because God fully entered into it, He will also fully redeem it.

As we sit in our suffering and know that the God of the universe decides to sit with us in it, we have a truth that is weighty enough to answer our heavy hearts, our loneliness and disillusionment that are intensified during the holidays. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that while God wants us happy as little children, it is the grown-up knowledge of God’s desire to always be with us, the fact that “we are no longer homeless; a bit of the eternal home itself has moved unto us,” that brings true joy. “Therefore we adults can rejoice deeply within our hearts under the Christmas tree,” he said, “perhaps much more than the children are able. We know that God’s goodness will once again draw near.”

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She will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel,
which means ‘God is with us.’
~ Matthew 1:23

Because of God’s tender mercy, the morning light from heaven is about to break upon us,
to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
and to guide us to the path of peace.
 ~ Luke 1:78-79

[via RELEVANT]

G&P
- Andrew

Haak Family Christmas Card (2010)

Finally, something I wanted to post two weeks ago, but with Christmas zaniness followed by a week of holidays I just never made the time. These photos were from a photo shoot my cousin Meagan did for Joelle in early November. I'll try to get a slideshow of photos set up soon.

We hope all of you had a Christmas full of comfort and joy, and that God will be near you as you make your way through the new year!

Blessings
- Andrew, Marie & Joelle