Yesterday was a day when I should have felt like I had it all together. I had eaten wisely, exercised (what?!), showered, and had done my hair and makeup. Check check check. I was finishing up a successful Christmas and grocery shopping trip (thank you Target for being almost all things to almost all women (until we get Costco, hehe)) with Chai latte in hand. But as I drove toward my last stop before heading home, I found myself sitting at a red light feeling completely empty. Why was that? This is supposed to be a season of glad tidings and good cheer. Why did my heart feel as heavy as the rain-laden clouds that dulled the sky?
Maybe I had missed a step, something crucial that when plugged into the Holiday Happiness Formula would instantly produce flurries of snow, cups of steaming cocoa, and good will toward all men. Or maybe I had done something wrong. I definitely spent more money than I had anticipated. But those gift tags were just so cute! And really, who doesn't need a rotating projector to blast Christmas cheer all over the front of their house in the dark hours of the evening? Was I having buyers remorse? What was nagging me so badly?
Maybe it was because this holiday season is fraught with relational tension. It's been a tough year for my heart, and while I am trying to work diligently and lovingly to retrace or reforge some paths between myself and others, many times it feels like one step forward and two steps back.
Or perhaps it was my kids. They had been a chore to drag from store to store. And my belabored decision-making was certainly hampered further by a constant need to supervise, shepherd, and search for my kids. Never are we more wandering souls than in the glittering aisles of the Wonder Shop at Target. But no. It wasn't their fault that I was feeling this way. In their own way they are caught up in joyful participation and anticipation. And they are just kids, still being formed and trained. I can't blame them.
No, the reason I felt bottomed out and caved in at that red light was not because I had done too much or too little. It wasn't because I'm treading lonely and confusing waters where once I had only experienced warmth and community. And it's certainly was not my kids fault for being happy and energetic. God bless them I'm glad they are healthy and whole today and every day! None of those surface explanations can touch the real issue.
The problem with me that day is the problem with this whole world. It's broken. I'm broken. In the beginning God made all things good. And we broke it. And we continue breaking it over and over again. And this brokenness cannot be fixed with feelings of accomplishment and a victory latte. We can't, I can't fix this brokenness at all. And that's what this season is truly all about. God knew that we would never come to Him to be fixed. And so He came to us. The eternally existent God came into the form and person of a finite man, to show us the way back to wholeness. Healing began in a manger, under a star.
The Christmas season can be good, and terrible. It's an emotional roller coaster of well-wishes and high hopes and the crashing thump of reality with things don't go as planned. We can tell ourselves to just roll with it because that's the way things are. And in some ways that's true. We should give ourselves the gifts of grace and reality, knowing that pretty much nothing will go according to our well-laid plans. But that isn't the ever and all. If nothing else this season needs to teach us to yearn and to hope. To know that eventually the Babe will return as the risen and victorious King and He will claim His own. He will forever fix our broken hearts and take us to Himself. That comfort and joy will be like none we have never known. And it will be forever.
