My Christmas Conundrum

There are many Christians who have objections to different aspects of Christmas. For many years I and many other like minded Christians have decried the secularization of Christmas. It has become a holiday centered around Santa Clause and reindeer and frantic shopping and over extending one's self financially to meet various relatives', friends', and colleagues' elevated expectations. The only Christ to be found in most Christmas celebrations is in the name, unless of course it is spelled Xmas to remove even that last vestigial reference to Jesus.

If I may digress here for a paragraph, the letter X actually is an accepted symbol of Christ. This should probably be kept to ourselves though. I'm sure that the ACLU, who in rather Grinch-like fashion try to steal a little bit more of our right to public expressions of Christmas each year, would probably object to that spelling also if they were to learn this.

Then there are the very strict, fundamentalists Christians who make the point (a very valid point by the way) that Christmas, as most Christian holidays we celebrate, finds it's origins in pagan traditions. Neither our Lord nor any one else in our Holy Bible ever commanded us to celebrate this holiday.

As for myself, frankly I have not been that ardent of a celebrant. I mean I'm not Ebenezer Scrooge or anything, but I could take it or leave it. If we had all stopped celebrating it a few years ago I would have offered no protest over it. I would have looked back at some aspects of it with a certain fondness. I like the pretty lights and some of the tunes are catchy and sing-a-long-able and who doesn't like celebrations that include lots of turkey and stuffing and usually multiple deserts, but my life in general would go on and my spiritual life would not suffer the least bit in it's absence. I would still be just as grateful for Christ's incarnation as ever I was.

BUT ...

The attacks on Christmas now come from secularists. As secular a celebration as Christmas has become, as much as it's focus has shifted away from Jesus' birth, to the point where many Christians barely see it as a Christian holiday, the secular progressives still have a problem with this holiday. Even after it has been gutted of it's spiritual significance and left only a shell of it's former self, they still can't stomach an official national holiday with any trace of Christian tradition or symbolism - overt or implied.

What is the conscientious Christian to do? Do we defend this holiday that can at this point only minimally can be called Christian and that many us only lukewarmly embraced to begin with? Or, do we let the secular progressives win the day and take control of the public square whilst our ideals and traditions are impugned, trampled on and quashed?

Quite the conundrum ...

I Wasted A Day

I wasted a day.

I am not proud of this.

It was perfect and untouched, rife with potential, a gift from God, and I squandered it away.

On the surface this doesn't sound like such a big deal. I have done so before with no perceived major consequences and so have you. And by wasting a day, I do not mean simply taking a day off. We all need a day here and there to rest and recharge. God even commands that we rest one day of every seven.

What I am speaking of is actually wasting a day, neither accomplishing anything worthwhile, nor finding rest or contentment.

My problem with this is twofold.

Firstly, I see a disturbing pattern here. I have done it before, with alarming frequency, and since according to Sir Isaac Newton, an object in motion tends to remain in motion in the same direction and at the same velocity unless acted upon by an outside force, I see no reason why, without some intervention, this pattern will not continue indefinitely. (or at least until the end of my days, because ...)

Secondly, the number of our days is finite. We are given a limited number of days in which to live.

Doing the math, if I live to be 80 years old, that gives me slightly more than 29,000 days to live (or waste). If I waste only 1 day per month that would be 960 wasted days – over 2 1/2 wasted years – years of days that I will never see again – each beckoning to be lived.

I can picture myself at the end of my life begging God for another two years and God patiently explaining to me that I already wasted two and one half years that He did give me. Why should He trust me with another two?!?

Now I will cut myself a little slack. I am, after all, human and I live in an imperfect world where 100% efficiency is an impossibility. But still, I can't help but feel that I can do better than I have so far. And the first step, as they say, is admitting I have a problem.

Lord please help me to redeem the time. Please forgive me for every day that I have wasted and help me to live every day that I am given!

I Need My Pain

“I don't want my pain taken away! I need my pain!” - Capt. James Tiberius Kirk

OK, maybe he is a fictional captain of a fictional starship on a fictional five year mission. Maybe warp drives, sub space frequencies and beaming ourselves through space are all fiction. Maybe Klingons, Vulcans, and Tribles only exist in the minds of Sci-Fi fans and at Trekkie Conventions, but there is some truth in this quote.

I do need a certain amount of pain to mold me into something beyond my former self. Not that my former self was a terrible thing, but that me was not as strong or as useful or as deep or as able to empathize with others' pain as the person my life experience has formed.

Analogies to this principle abound. Precious metals are purified by fiery heat. Diamonds are formed through intense pressure transforming simple carbon into something both strong and beautiful. A seed must fall to the ground and die before it can grow into what it will be.

Gold is still gold as it is formed in the ground. It still is what it is. There is nothing wrong with it. But compare that to the finished product, after it has been purified, and the difference is astounding.

There is nothing at all wrong with carbon. It has many uses. But compare that to the strength and beauty of a diamond, forged over time in the intense pressure deep within the Earth, and you appreciate the difference.

What about a slab of marble? It is valuable in and of itself. But, how much does it's value and beauty increase as the master craftsman patiently chisels away at it?

How about the tree that produces beautiful fruit after a dormant season and a good pruning?

I guess my point is that we all gain strength, value and yes, even beauty – and produce more and better fruit – as we endure the heat, the pressure, the dying to self, the pruning and the patient chiseling by the hand of the Master.

As I was going through my divorce the pain and hurt were so intense that at times I felt like I could not take it for one more minute. I asked God over and over “why?”. Could He not have accomplished my growth by some less painful means? It was only over time that I realized that I am so stubborn, and slip so easily into complacency, that as long as I am comfortable, I will not change and grow.

Please don't think that at this point that I have it all together. It's not like I can say thank you God for allowing me to go through a divorce so that I could learn valuable lessons. I am not to that point yet. I may never be that spiritual. But I can say thank you God for all that you have taught me in going through this. Thank you God for not allowing it to be a wasted opportunity. Thank You that it was not just pointless suffering. Thank You for each lesson learned, even if the lesson came at a high price.

Pain is necessary.

However, on this point I must disagree with our intrepid, fictitious captain ...

I don't need to carry my pain around with me for the rest of my life!

As much as I need my pain, I also need it healed! I do need to carry around the lessons I have learned forever and make them a part of who I am. That does not mean that I need to carry the pain itself with me and to feel it for the rest of my life. Letting go of the pain does not mean that the scars or the lessons will be lost.

It is enough to remember my pain. Why drag it around like a ball and chain? Why let it drag me down? Why let it hamper me or slow me down? Why not throw off those shackles and cry freedom and walk on unencumbered?

Letting go of my pain – you wouldn't believe what I went through to learn that lesson ...