Children Drown at Advent too

As I sit here, there is an 8 year old boy looking over my shoulder and trying to play with my keyboard.

This is far from a rare occurrence in my work.

As annoying as it is sometimes, it also brings me joy to see a kid simply being a kid. The children we serve don’t often get this opportunity. Sure, there are organizations whose whole stated goal is to provide children with the opportunity to play and spend some time just being kids. Project Play is one such example, and it’s one of our favorite organizations to work with.

But every once in a while, we’re struck by the reality that these kids face: a life of constant change, where each day they see new faces, where they may not know where they’ll sleep from one night to the next.

And then I look at my own children, and it hits me like a wall of bricks. Any day now, we might read a news story that one of the kids we’ve come to love has become a statistic in some government log somewhere, one of countless others who have died on their journey to safety.

It’s hard enough to get to know an adult woman in this situation and then see her go off to attempt a dangerous sea crossing. At least she understands and has made an informed choice that this risk will be worth taking.

But the children.

I must admit, I’m not usually much of a kid person. I don’t gravitate toward playing with children. I don’t seek out opportunities to work with them. I’m grateful for people who do have that calling. But my edges have softened since I’ve had children on my own, and once in a while I accidentally fall in love with a baby or a child.

Nobody’s perfect.

And then, one day, the child’s mother informs me that she is taking the baby on a dangerous journey. And then I die a little inside.

Advent continues. And in this season we’re confronted with a paradox of the excited expectation of the arrival of Baby Jesus, with the knowledge that on Good Friday he will be lifted up on a cross.

This is a paradox I, and many others here at this border and at borders around the word, face every single day.

So as we continue our Advent season, let us fully confront and recognize this duality, this paradox of the juxtaposition of joy and sorrow.

After all, this is not the only paradox we face in our lives as followers of Christ. It was Jesus who told us, “The first shall be last, and the last shall be first,” and “Blessed are the hungry,” and, “He who would be great among you must be a servant.”

Our lives are full of these paradoxes, where two things seemingly cannot be true, yet they are both true, just the same.

I encourage you to recognize and embrace these paradoxes, not to block them our or pretend that they don’t exist. And I encourage you to give your whole heart, even though you know that it ll will break one day. Give yourself to others, even though it causes deep and immense pain sometimes.

As a wise many once said, “It is in giving that we receive.”