a picture of red Christmas candles

This blog is part three of a four-part Advent series.

Dr. Jenny John

My father died seven years ago and his birthday, on December 15, has made me acutely aware of how grief and joy intertwine during the Advent season. Walking through that first difficult winter of grief, I experienced Advent and Christmas in a quieter, deeper, and more profound way than ever before. The peace, joy, and hope proclaimed in this season of expectation did not replace my loneliness, confusion, and sadness. Rather, they came to walk hand in hand with them.

In those weeks, the hymns of the Church became my prayers. I remember singing “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” with tears in my eyes and a deep longing in my heart.

O come, O come Emmanuel,
and ransom captive Israel,
that mourns in lonely exile here,
until the Son of God appear.

Never had those words rung more true. Never had the cry of Israel felt so close to my own cry for God’s nearness.

On this side of that first Christmas in Bethlehem, we live with the assurance that our Savior has come. Christ entered a dark and chaotic world not to stand at a distance, but to walk hand in hand with us. The Word made flesh experienced grief, loneliness, and the full weight of human sorrow so that we would know a Messiah who knows us.

Uncertainty, discomfort, unfamiliar surroundings, and interrupted plans marked that first Christmas. Mary and Joseph found themselves far from home, without family or the familiar security of their community. In fact, soon after Jesus’ birth they were forced to flee to a foreign land to protect their newborn son. Yet this was the place the Joy of Heaven chose to dwell. God enters the very places we least expect him; he enters our grief, our confusion, our disrupted plans. The joy of Christmas is not that God lifts us out of sorrow, but that he steps into it and abides with us there.

Our church will hold a Longest Night service at the close of Advent. This is a service that gently offers hope and reassurance to those who mourn. It is a liturgy where grief is neither hidden nor hurried and where lament and hope take their place together before God. It reminds us that Advent is a time to find comfort in community and in God’s presence, even amid sorrow.

During that first season of grieving my father’s death, I experienced a nearness of the Lord in a manner I had not known before. Jesus was my friend who sat beside me, carried my burdens, wept with me, and reassured me of his care. The promise of Emmanuel, God with us, became intimately personal.

Psalm 98 calls all of creation to shout for joy to the Lord because he “has made his salvation known and revealed his righteousness to the nations” (98:2, NIV). In 1719, Isaac Watts composed the hymn “Joy to the World” as a reflection on that psalm from the perspective of the New Testament church. It is a hymn proclaiming that it is for the very coming of Jesus—Emmanuel, God with us—that we shout with joy. A God who is with us in every valley, in every exile, and in every season of waiting.

No more let sin and sorrow grow,
nor thorns infest the ground.
He comes to make His blessings flow,
far as the curse is found.

That first Advent and Christmas without my father gave me a gift I did not expect, the gift of a Savior who abides with us amid all things. The joy of Christmas is not a fleeting happiness; it is a confidence in the God who knows us and in Jesus the Messiah, who comes to us and who stays near.

May this Advent season remind us that Emmanuel has come—and still comes—in our sorrow, our grieving, and our uncertainty. May the Lord who walked with me in my grief walk with you as well, bringing his peace, presence, and unending joy.

Dr. Jenny John is assistant professor of counseling, director of the Hamilton Counseling Department.