By Rev. Gracie Millard, Associate Pastor, Trietsch Memorial UMC
Last December, about two weeks before Christmas, I presided over a memorial service at our church. All around me, people were (rightfully) preparing for the Christmas programs and activities. I felt the juxtaposition of what I was preparing for and what everyone else was preparing for. I knew I was joining the crowded club of pastors who had faced this situation in their years of ministry. That’s life, though, right? Death and suffering don’t take a holiday. Diagnoses and crises and accidents don’t care what time of year it is.
It feels especially cruel when bad things happen around Christmas. It’s the holiday focused on love, joy, hope, and peace – how come everyone else gets to relish in those things while we feel the deep cut of grief? Why does every other family get a picture-perfect Christmas while we have to figure out a new normal? How quickly we assume what others advertise is the whole picture!
Christmas is exactly what we need to get through the hard times. The gift of Christmas–the birth of Jesus Christ, God-With-Us–is the very antidote to the hardest parts of life! The birth of Jesus brings peace, hope, joy, and love to a world who desperately needs it. Who is Christmas for if not for hurt, hopeless, grief-stricken, overwhelmed people?
Yes, we may have a handful of magical Christmases (and praise God for those!), but the imperfect ones, the painful ones, the ones tinged with sadness–those are the Christmases we’re reminded of just how meaningful the birth of Jesus is, just how much we need it. After all, the very first Christmas was far from picture-perfect: a scandalous birth in a space fit for animals. The messiness of his birth helps us see exactly what the gift of Jesus is: hope, peace, joy, and love right in the midst of a world that overwhelms us. When something goes wrong this Christmas (‘cause it probably will!), praise God for the gift of Christmas!
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