Indigo

It should be no surprise that I've decorated for Christmas using the color Blue.

My rooms are full of blue

year long

and every season.

But this year, Blue,

INDIGO,

has taken on a deeper meaning,

as I've looked at the Shepherds,

and felt the night watches

like never before.

Are you a blue person?  I think there are some of us who choose
the color blue as a favorite, for deeper reasons than we may have thought.  I usually pick "blue" whenever a random sampling of color faves is set before me. But it's not my only favorite. I waver between yellow and peach and lavendar, depending on my mood.

So where does this color feeling come from that is associated with blue?  

A friend sent me a link to this song by Fernando Ortega this week. It is a song that I sent to her several months ago.

And, it is a song that another friend had sent to me many

years ago, after I had my first glimpse of an

Indigo Bunting,

a beautiful blue bird that flashes like sapphire

if you are lucky enough to see him.

But the thing with this song is something I never realized until we moved into a house close to the woods, with a perfect setting for those beautiful birds. It really does take a stormy, cloudy day to see the full vividness of Indigo. On a sunny day, the color gets muted by the bright lights, but on those dark days, that flash of Indigo cuts through all of the surrounding gloom. 

And in the dark watches of the night,

what is the color of Hope that flashes through the gloom

in my heart?

I think God must have planned it this way.

Because even the ancient garment, the Ephod, worn by the

High Priest

was woven with that indigo blue.

"The three colors woven into the ephod were symbolic of Christ's incarnation, ministry, and second advent. The blue, probably indigo, was produced from a species of shellfish and speaks of Christ, who came down from heaven as the Son of God to do the Father's will."  

from "The Tabernacle: Shadows of the Messiah" by David M. Levy

"They made the ephod of gold, and of blue, purple and scarlet yarn, and of finely twisted linen."

Exodus 39:2, NIV 

This garment worn by the High Priest, and the dark blue of the night watches, where the Shepherds kept watch, they both point to this coming flash of light, a vivid awakening to HOPE where God met with the storms of mankind.

Jesus didn't come to a world that was bright and perfect and shining full of light.  No, He came right into a stormy mess, where a downtrodden people were crying out for justice, already having waited for what seemed like forever to find that clear patch of blue that was promised to them.

God opened the Heavens

and sent out His own dear gift of Indigo,

a patch of blue sky

to say 

"I love you"

to a world gone haywire.

In the night watches of these days

as my husband recovers from surgery,

and my weakened body

feels too overwhelmed

for a HOLIDAY,

my Lord parts the sky

and says

"I love you."

And Christmas is born again in me.

Is His Christmas born in you this year?

I pray that you will receive His gift

His

"I love you"

sent through the night.  

Linking with:
 #TellHisStory, Jennifer Dukes Lee

#TeaAndWordTuesday, Meg Weyerbacher