I am writing this to you, my friends.
Life is fragile. Relationships are too. Time moves on. We do not know how long we have, together and then distant, blessed even to be a memory.
There's a tenderness in recognizing fragility—not as something to fear, but as something that makes each moment precious. The temporary nature of our time together doesn't diminish its value; it magnifies it. Every conversation, every shared meal, every ordinary Tuesday becomes sacred when we hold it with open hands, knowing nothing is guaranteed.
Blessed even to be a memory...
Having lost my mother and father these last few years, I find myself consciously holding on to memories. Sometimes though, oftentimes times, a memory surfaces from the littlest trigger. So too with aunts & uncles, and even a name from the past. I'm to an age when the years are dotted more & more with conversions.
Even after physical presence ends, love persists in a different form. We carry each other forward. The people who've shaped us remain woven into who we are, how we see the world, what we value. Memory becomes a form of continued presence, a way love transcends the limitations of time and distance.
Jews will say to the bereaved, "May their memory be a blessing" or in Hebrew, "Zichronam livracha (z"l). The concept is not just acknowledging the deceased, it's expressing hope that the person's life—their character, their deeds, their love—continues to bless the living. Their memory becomes active, not passive. It shapes how we live, how we love, how we treat others.
When someone's memory is a blessing, they haven't truly left us. Their influence ripples forward through the lives they touched, the kindness they modeled, the wisdom they shared. They live on in the hearts and actions of those who remember them. It's a profound understanding of legacy.
James 4:14 says our life "is a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes," but that brevity doesn't make it meaningless—it makes it urgent. It calls us to love well now, to reconcile quickly, to say the words that matter while there's still breath to say them.
The word "Christmas" literally means "our Messiah." Jews and Christians both believe in their being a Messiah. Jews long for the Messiah. So do Christians!
Even though Christians believe Jesus is the Messiah who has come, believers still live in profound longing for His return, for the fulfillment of all He promised, for the restoration of all things. The New Testament is filled with this yearning—"Come, Lord Jesus" (Revelation 22:20), "Maranatha" (1 Corinthians 16:22).
We both look around at suffering, injustice, death, broken relationships—the very fragility I spoke of earlier—and we ache for the day when "He will wipe every tear from their eyes" (Revelation 21:4). In that sense, Christians are still a people of longing, still waiting, still not fully satisfied.
So there's something deeply connective about Jews and Christians both being people who live in hope for the Messiah—looking forward to when God's anointed one brings complete shalom, justice, healing, and the fullness of God's presence. Both communities refuse to accept the world as it is and insist something more is coming.
Until that day comes and Messiah arrives, we live to love. Not because everything is resolved or perfect. Not because we have all the answers or can fix what's broken. But because love is what we're made for, what we're called to, what echoes the divine nature itself. 1 John 4:8 says simply, "God is love." 1 Corinthians 13:13 - "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."
Until that day comes—we live to love. We love imperfectly, but we love. We love knowing it's fragile, but we love anyway. We love because we've been loved first.
This makes Christmas bittersweet in a way. Christians celebrate that God has come near, that the rescue mission has begun, that hope has entered the world. But we also feel the incompleteness—the Messiah came as a vulnerable baby, not yet as the conquering king. We celebrate what has begun while longing for what's still to come.
Jerusalem, Jerusalem...how often I have longed. What are we to do? We are to love.
1 John 4:7-8—Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
Numbers 6:24-26 - "The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace."
