When I began writing this post, my aim was to share a struggle I had been having over the last several years, one that I had no resolution for. Not having an answer, I just wanted to be real and honest. As I was writing I got kind of stuck, so I decided to come back to the post in a few days and try to finish it up. Amazingly, in those few days, God gave me the answer I had been looking for all along! He is so good and faithful!
Christmas is different now. When I was a kid, every Christmas Eve, before we went to bed, my mom would read the nativity story. It was one of my favorite traditions. I loved the reminder that Christmas was more than just presents and lights and trees and cookies. But if I am honest, when I woke up on Christmas morning, Jesus was the last thing on my mind. When I was a kid, Christmas was all about Santa and presents and sweets and family.
Although I have believed in God and Jesus since I was a child, it was only about five years ago that I learned what it really meant to love and follow God. To not just have faith, but to live it. And ever since, Christmas has been different.
I guess maybe before, I was blissfully ignorant. I found happiness on Christmas just by giving and receiving gifts, and enjoying the presence of family. I liked watching movies about Santa, seeing Christmas lights, and singing songs about snow, cozy fires, and mistletoe.
It’s not that I don’t still enjoy those things, but I began feeling a sadness at Christmas that I hadn’t known before. It was hard for me to celebrate the birth of a precious baby knowing the fate that awaited Him. How could I be joyful, knowing the suffering that He would endure… knowing that I am the reason He was nailed to the cross. He was just as innocent when He died as He was when He was born.
I tried to put myself in the place of the people who were on the earth when Jesus was born. They had read the scriptures. They knew the Messiah was coming. They had waited for hundreds of years. And at last, finally, He was born! How excited they must have been! Surely they did not know the trials He would face. All they knew was that their Savior had finally come. The last several years I have wished I could feel that excitement at Christmastime.
Maybe this year I can…
My six-year-old son is in the choir for our church’s Christmas Musical this year. He has been practicing his songs a lot and they frequently get stuck in my head. I find myself singing them around the house all day. Today, the one that was stuck in my head was one about the angels coming to tell the shepherds the good news of Jesus’ birth: “Do not be afraid, I bring good news of great joy…”
I stopped singing as I pondered those words. When God sent the announcement of His Son’s birth into the world, he called it “good news of great joy!” Who am I to argue with God? If He says that the birth of His Son is good and joyous, then I need to let go of these feelings of sadness and guilt, and instead rejoice!
Is it that simple? I don’t know yet. Part of my journey in faith is reconciling the sadness and guilt I feel about Jesus’ death with the wonder of the gift of salvation that I received through it. It feels wrong to not be sad about Jesus’ death. But it was part of God’s plan from the beginning, and Jesus willingly gave it all out of love for us.
I guess this Christmas, I will try to focus more on the amazing gifts God gave through the birth of His Son, and remember that all of Jesus’ sufferings were also a gift, a free gift to all.
But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
Luke 2:10-11
Merry Christmas!
~Sarah~
