Christmas is not Canceled!

“Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” – Matt. 1:23)

          A number of years ago now, I wrote a story entitled “The Year that Christmas Ended.”  It was about 1985, the year that two of my three living grandparents died in the two weeks leading up to Christmas.  That year, there were no family gatherings on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.  Gone were the days when relatives and friends would gather at our house for goodies and carols after the Christmas Eve service.  It was sad and it was difficult, and it turned Christmas into a depressing time of year.

          Fast forward in time to my first year in Winnipeg.  After the well-attended Christmas Eve service, everybody spilled out into the parking lot to head home.  I was left at the church by myself, cleaning up after communion, because whoever was supposed to look after it forgot.  I then went home – alone – to prepare for the service the next morning.  Thankfully, one family invited me for Christmas dinner the next day.

          My reason for sharing these stories is not to look for sympathy, but simply to say that I am well acquainted with difficult Christmases.  And so, this year, when people are being told not to gather, it really makes very little difference for me personally.  However, I am well aware that this is not the case for all those who are used to seeing their families and their extended family at Christmas.

         The truth of the matter is that Christmas did not end in 1985 as my story title suggested, and neither will it be “canceled” this year.  However, many of us will be challenged to turn our attention from all of the things that we have learned to associate with Christmas to the reason that we have this holiday in the first place – the birth of Christ.

          Where we focus our attention makes a lot of difference.  If we are focused on everything that we will not be able to do, and everything that we will be missing, and all of our losses, of course we will be miserable.  However, when we actually focus on the birth of Jesus – the one who came especially for the lonely and the downtrodden and the poor and the outcast – we become aware of the presence of the one who is “God with us.”

          I have often reflected on how Mary and Joseph were far from home and surrounded mainly by animals when Jesus was born.  The first visitors were not family, but shepherds – lowly, smelly shepherds – who came to see the baby and then went off to tell everybody.  There was no Christmas dinner or family gathering, and nothing had been decorated, either.  There was simply a birth like no other.

          This year, we are invited once again to focus our attention on Jesus.  We are also invited to take advantage of the opportunities available to us for online worship, Advent devotions, and prayer.  In the midst of stress and worries and sadness and tiredness, God continues to come to us through Jesus Christ.  May the blessing of knowing that he is near fill your hearts this Christmas, and may the peace of Christ be with you always!

                    In Christ,

                    Pastor Lynne Hutchison