Patched, Not Perfect

For some, it’s the lighted Christmas tree in the living room that says the Christmas season is underway. Others feel it when they first hear carols coming out of the stereo, see lighted displays on the nighttime drive home from work, or smell gingerbread baking in the oven. But nothing puts the holiday happiness in my heart like seeing my Christmas decorations on top of my kitchen cabinets once more. Twinkling colored lights twisted through a lengthy garland edge a display of stuffed Christmas characters interspersed with decorated shopping bags and holiday-themed plates. In the course of the forty years I have lived in this house, certain items have laid claim to their own positions in the display. Stuffed versions of Rudolph and Clarice insist on being placed directly over the oven, their noses almost touching as if kissing under invisible mistletoe, while the Abominable Snowman roars menacingly from a nearby corner. A lamb sleeps in a lion’s arms at the other end of the cabinetry, representing the peace of the season, while penguins, snowmen and gingerbread people wave merrily at any who happen to look in their direction. As much as I love each of the individual elements of the display, it’s the lights that make it special to me.

Nothing speaks hope in a darkened world like a string of brightly twinkling lights. That’s why I was devastated to look up one day early in the season and see that a section of the garland in the center of the display had gone dark. Everything else was still in place; the reindeer still posed, the snowmen still waved, and the Christmas bags still displayed their messages of goodwill. But it seemed meaningless and joyless somehow without the lights winding through it all.

Some of you know exactly what I mean. The light has gone out of your Christmas this year and you find yourself just going through the motions without the joy that makes the holiday season so bright. The loss of your spouse has dimmed your delight and left you with an absent face and an empty place at the dinner table. You have lost your hope of a happy holiday season this year.

Some of us deal with these difficulties by just opting out. We decide to just skip Christmas this year. We vow to celebrate as usual again next year when we feel more in the spirit of things. And in doing so we miss the chance to have the most precious holiday season of any that’s gone before… because never have we needed it more. Christmas is fun when things are going well in life. But its true meaning is discovered when things are not going as planned… when life is interrupted by some unexpected darkness.

The message of Christmas is that God is with us in the midst of our trouble. Even when we feel most alone, He is aware of our situation, collecting our tears, and counting the days till the culmination arrives. Surely God was with Mary long before the actual birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. She physically carried the Answer to her prayers during the days of her humiliating pregnancy… on that long jolting ride on the back of a donkey… in those painful hours of delivery in the hay of a stable floor. It was at the height of her distress that Hope was born, and she was suddenly able to see and hold the baby whose very name spoke the Christmas message: Emmanuel, “God is with us.”

And so it can be for you. The wonder of a difficult Christmas is the opportunity to learn anew that though your circumstances might be challenging, you are not alone in them. Hope is longing to be born anew in their midst. As you travel the difficult road to your own personal Bethlehem, know that there is help available to those who are struggling to find their way. What a lesson there is for us in that even the wise men searching for Jesus had to stop and ask for direction, not once, but multiple times. There is an often overlooked Christmas gift tucked into the paragraphs of the Bible describing the event. Hidden in the story are the words, “And receiving an answer to their asking, they were divinely instructed…” (Matthew 9:12 AMP, emphasis mine). They asked what to do, and received an answer. We can do the same.

My kitchen garland is shining brightly again now. I found extra short strings of lights I had bought at the end of the season last year and was able to weave a new strand in with the old to get me through until I can buy a new garland at a later date. And so it is with the more serious aspects of this holiday season. If you’re struggling in any way, ask for help, especially of God, and receive with joy and thanksgiving the assistance that comes in a wide variety of forms. Your Christmas may be patched rather than perfect, but it can be perfectly wonderful, just the same.

“Direct my footsteps according to your word…” (Psalm 119:133 NIV)

 

 

Flowers for Thanksgiving

 

I struggled the other day with “blue” Monday-like feelings on what should have been a happy Friday afternoon.

It’s a rare occurrence in my life. I have been gifted with a generous dose of “the oil of gladness”, and generally it’s in overflow mode. But every once in a while, gloom settles in like a thick November fog. I feel drippy and sad instead of joyful. And because it’s such a rare occurrence for me, I struggle more than most on a bad day.

Most shake the mood off with a shrug of the shoulders. “It happens”, they say. And I get that. But it rarely happens to me. So it’s important to have coping methods in place so that the feelings don’t overtake me, and so that one bad day doesn’t turn into a string of the same. I need a refresher course on how to “shake it off”.

First, I remember Whose I am, that I am not alone, but deeply loved by an ever-present God. I make sure I take care of my physical needs, to eat something good for me, foods that feed my body and soul, not my mood. I remind myself to exercise to release the right hormones and serotonins into my system… and to get enough sleep.

More than anything else, however, I need to remember gratitude, and to rehearse my blessings, the gifts of the day. The Jesus Calling devotional instructs me to look for and pluck the flowers God has placed along the pathway of my life… to gather them in a beautiful bouquet of thanksgiving to present to Him at the end of the day.

For years I’ve felt the need to have a floral centerpiece on my Thanksgiving table. I’m especially fond of the ones that have a candle in the middle of the arrangement. I thought I was just bringing a touch of beauty to add to the day. Now I know that God had a purpose behind the practice, a reminder to let each flower represent a grateful thought, and to put together as many as I could as an offering of thanks. I found that the mental practice relit the joy in my life, much as the physical act of striking a match put a flame to the wick on that wax stick… and that my gloomy thoughts simply melted away.

“In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.”

(1 Thessalonians 5:18 KJV)

Looking For the Son

Imagine, if you will, a huge grid laid out upon a wall. On the left-hand side, listed from top to bottom are the months of the year, while the days of the month are posted in ascending order from left to right across the bottom. At each space inside the grid is posted a picture of the sunrise on that day of the year. It was a showstopper of a display, filling us with wonder at the results of the photographer’s personal challenge to snap a picture of the sunrise each day. Not just for one year… but for five years, going on six, Bugsy Sailor was ready every morning, camera in hand, to document the moment the sun broke over the horizon.  

He couldn’t always see it. Understandably some days were cloudy, stormy, or foggy at the moment of sunrise. But the point is that he was there and snapped a picture, whether the sun was visible or not.

It was fun to pick a date and locate the photograph for that day and year combo. On the back of each picture he answered three questions: 1) Where was the picture taken? 2)What was the weather like?, and 3) Did the sun rise?

I loved the fact that the answer to Question #3 was always “Yes”. Whether he could see it or not, Bugsy knew that yes, the sun did indeed rise.

Perhaps after the loss of your spouse you have wondered if the sun would ever shine on your future again. Maybe  you can’t imagine what the days ahead will look like without the love of your life walking beside you. Surely for many, the plans and expectations for your future years will have to be changed or rearranged. I guess that’s what so impressed me with this man’s mission. When the night was dark around him, he rose and went looking for the sun.

I found the discovery of Bugsy Sailor’s personal challenge so inspiring that I adopted it myself. I am not a photographer, and I don’t usually see the physical rising of the sun over the horizon. Rather, I experience the spiritual rise of the Son in my heart during my devotional time at the same hour each morning, and I document the event in my subsequent journal entries.  

And I have discovered the same thing he did – that no matter what I’m facing each day, be it fun and adventure, or uncertainty and difficulty, the Son always rises. And making the effort to rise and look for Him at an early hour of the morning enables me to face the rest of the hours of the day, and even an uncertain future, with peace and joy.

After 1718 consecutive mornings, Bugsy missed the sunrise on Day #1719. A dead phone battery kept his alarm from going off and he overslept. Can you imagine his despair? In that instant he faced a serious moment of decision. Should he pack it all up and be done with the project… or continue on? I love the fact that he simply got up the next morning and was back at it again.

We, too, for whatever reason, will have mornings when we fail to look for the Lord. The important thing is not that our “streak” remains unbroken, but that we get up again the next day and the next and the next. Life is better when we make the effort to look for the Son.

Bugsy challenges each of us to see more sunrises this year than we did last year. He says, “Most importantly, remember no matter how cloudy the day, or the adversity you face, the sun still rises.”

That’s good news for me and you. The Bible says it, too: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,’ declares the Lord…” (Jeremiah 29:13-14 NIV, emphasis mine).

When life is at its darkest, God’s Word still holds true.