The Benefits of a Not-So-Perfect Christmas

Scripture — John 1:14 (NRSV)

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.

Devotion

So, how was your celebration of Christmas Day? I say “Christmas Day” because we are actually still in the season of Christmas according to the Christian calendar with its 12-day Christmastide. Usually, however, we tend to think of Christmas as a one-day event or perhaps something that begins on Christmas Eve and ends on Christmas night.

Many of us approach our Christmas celebrations with high hopes. We look forward to joyful reunions with family and friends. We anticipate inspiring Christmas Eve and/or Christmas Day worship services. We expect to eat tasty holiday food. And we pray that the gifts we are giving to people will actually meet with their approval. If we’re traveling, we are eager for the weather to cooperate so we can get to our destinations and home on time. Speaking of weather, in some parts of the world, a perfect Christmas must include just enough snow to be festive, but not enough to keep loved ones from completing their travels.

So, how was your celebration of Christmas Day? How did it all work out for you? Were your expectations completely fulfilled? Or did certain things not quite measure up? In my experience, usually something happens on Christmas Day that threatens to dampen my mood. For example, last year my sister and her husband were sick and unable to join our gathering of family and friends. That made me sad. Plus, I still have my brother-in-law’s unopened Christmas gift from last year and will give it to him this year, Lord willing.

Of course, sometimes the things that make Christmas less than perfect are much more serious. You may have experienced the first Christmas without a dear loved one. Or perhaps your spouse or child is stationed overseas in the armed services and wasn’t able to come home. And then, of course, there is the steady flow of depressing news stories that remind us of the violence, injustice, and suffering in our world. When facing such far less-than-perfect realities, it can be hard to sing “Joy to the world the Lord has come.”

What I’m about to write may sound strange to you, even nonsensical. So, after I write it, I’ll explain what I mean. Perhaps you will give me a thumbs-up.

I want to put in a good word for not-so-perfect Christmas celebrations. To be sure, it’s wonderful when everything works out as we had hoped. But there is something deeply meaningful and even truthful about those times when our Christmas celebrations are marred by unfortunate and even painful things.

I first started thinking this way a decade ago when my family and I visited Israel. We went to all the standard sacred sites and were glad to visit them. But I was consistently bothered by the fact that these holy places were often marred by human imperfections. For example, my quiet meditation on the shore of the Sea of Galilee was interrupted by three young men who were making a terrible racket with their jet skis. I wanted to yell at them, “Don’t you know this is a sacred place and you have to be quiet?” Then, while walking along the Via Dolorosa (Sorrowful Way) in Jerusalem, the path that Jesus walked while carrying the cross, I was distressed by vendors selling gaudy souvenirs and even by a sign that read “Pizza de la Rosa,” a clear play on words with Via Dolorosa. How disrespectful! In Nazareth, right next to the church built on the location believed to be where the angel appeared to Mary, there was a giant sign denouncing one who did not follow Islam as “one of the losers.” These are just a few examples of things in Israel that seemed at first to ruin the inspiration of my experience there.

But then, by God’s grace, it dawned on me that what I was experiencing was theologically profound and ironically truthful. You see, the Word of God made flesh did not come into a quiet, inspiring, peaceful, and perfect world. Far from it! Jesus was born into a world of strife, inconvenience, and discomfort. Though he sometimes went out into deserted places to pray, Jesus lived, worked, preached, and healed in the real world with all its disappointments and distractions. I realized that my desire for a romanticized experience of Israel really didn’t represent the Israel into which Jesus came as the Word of God Incarnate. What I was experiencing, along with all of my frustrations, helped me see with new eyes the truth of God coming among us in Jesus, the very thing we celebrate at Christmas.

It now seems good to me that when we experience a not-so-perfect Christmas, this can help us embrace the reality of the birth of our Savior. Jesus, the divine Son of God, was born into a real world of pain and suffering, violence and injustice, poverty and insecurity. He wasn’t, after all, laid in an über-comfortable crib in the Bethlehem Hilton. Nor did he grow up in a land of freedom and flourishing. No, Jesus came into a world that was just as messed up as our world is today.

So, if you had a perfect celebration of Christmas yesterday, that’s wonderful—a  glimpse of the age to come. But if, like most people, your Christmas wasn’t everything you hoped it would be, then take heart. Jesus came into such a world as yours. Jesus understands. Moreover, through the Spirit, Jesus is present with you today much as he was present in the flesh two millennia ago. Thus, if your Christmas was not what you hoped it would be, or if even if you’re feeling powerfully sad, Jesus gets it.

More to the point, Jesus gets you. This is good news, indeed! Remember the good news found in the New Testament letter to the Hebrews:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Heb 4:15-16).

Banner image by Jason M on Unsplash.

Find all Life for Leaders devotions here. Explore what the Bible has to say about work at the unique website of our partners, the Theology of Work Project’s online commentary. Reflection on today’s Life for Leaders theme can be found here: In the Beginning Was the Word (John 1:1-18).

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