History

Appomattox, Virginia.

If you had asked me about Appomattox, Virginia, a year ago, I would have given you a blank stare.

But God has blessed me with a middle-schooler who is learning her US history with her dad's help.

Driving through Virginia last month, I made it a point to stop at the Appomattox Courthouse, pick up a couple of postcards for my daughter, and soak in a little bit of our country's history. After watching the short documentary they offer on-site about what was involved in that week of US history, my only regret was not having my daughter with me to share in the experience. If this is not a chapter of US history that is familiar to you, it is the time and place where the US Civil War concluded.

A week after I visited Virginia, while having dinner with some dear old friends in Pennsylvania, I mentioned that I had stopped in Appomattox. All four of their faces lit up as they said, "Oh...Appomattox! Really!" Now this was a family who knew their American history!

We live in a world that has such fascinating storylines that have brought us to this moment in time. All of that is wrapped up in a grander storyline of God's kingdom, his rule and reign that encompasses it all. Where Heaven touches Earth is not just a fanciful idea. By now you are probably aware that as a Christian, I believe that God is not just real but that he is truly present. By his design, he has written himself into the story that is playing out in and around us all. The Confederate soldiers who struggled under the burden of the long campaign, wearing wool in the summer heat, weary from seeing their kin and countrymen cut down skirmish by skirmish...all of this was known and felt by God. God's knowledge is not merely the curse of omniscience; it is his heart to stay in the suffering. While it is true that he is beyond, even above all things—transcendent—he is also immanent, sensing more than we can imagine. Your situation, be it overflowing with blessing and joy or swamped in struggle, defeat, and shame, he is fully aware.

History includes the understanding that comes from an ever-widening view of mankind's saga. It also includes a view privy to the details of a town, a family, the challenges of children and parents alike. Maybe you already have an appetite for history. It is incomplete if you don't notice God being written into it all.

Rembrandt painted himself into paintings. Josh Plainse, a writer for Ranker.com, notes 22 different popular authors/creators who appear in cameos in their work. You may think of Stan Lee appearing in all of his Marvel Comics movies, or even Stephen King appearing in a handful of his films. Our creator has "appeared" many times: one time with angels to share a meal at Abraham's tent, or to Joshua, armed and bearing the name "The Commander of the Lord's Armies." Burning bushes. The whirlwind. Do you know where I'm going with this? Tell me a bit of your story. Do you see him looming large in the background?

We celebrate the birth of Jesus of Nazareth in late December. Like the significance of early April 1865 in a tiny community twenty-five miles east of Lynchburg, Virginia, the meaning of Christmas simply escaped me—until a close friend informed me of its cosmic significance. God didn't just come in the appearance of a man; he came in the physical form of a human, just like all humans enter this world, as a baby. Talk about a cameo.

—R. R. Watt