It was the same every year. As a child, on Christmas Day, we could always count on our next-door neighbors to have their Christmas tree dumped at the curb waiting to be collected by the disposal company (that was back in the day when such magical things were possible!) Frequently, the tree would still be draped in tinsel. I thought it was the saddest thing to see on a Christmas Day. It was as if Christmas itself had been tossed.
As an adult, I get it. The run up to Christmas is exhausting. I just saw a meme today which read, “My patience is basically like a gift card. Not sure how much is left on it, but we can give it a try.”
Another meme read, “I’m really trying to get into the Christmas spirit…I just can’t get the cork out.”
Then there was this surprising hit from Christian artist Matthew West, “Dysfunctional Family Christmas.” West sings about the peacefulness of snow falling and how everything is calm and bright until the in-laws show up bringing with them the baggage and the dysfunction.
I don’t know if any of these were the reasons why my neighbors tossed their tree on Christmas Day, but I always wondered if they had just had it with the season. I wonder if you might feel the same way.
We’re just days away from Christmas and many of us feel it’s up to us to create the best Christmas ever. And we can’t do it. None of us can. But we keep trying without much success. Remember the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.
It’s God who created Christmas, not us. The same God who decided to take on our human flesh through a baby, to show us what love was all about. And it wasn’t a perfect Christmas, no matter how we try to portray it. The birth of Jesus was as messy as any human birth. The takeaway from the Nativity stories is that nothing turned out as planned except this – Jesus came into the world.
Jesus knew that he was coming into a world full of dysfunctional family Christmases, but he came anyway. Jesus wasn’t looking for us to create the perfect Christmas. He himself was the perfect Christmas and all he wanted from us was to just claim what he was giving – life, love, peace and joy. “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)
This is my hope and prayer for you this season. Keep the tree up for as long as you can. Try to find a quiet time just to sit in front of it and look at the lights and remember, The true Light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. John 1:9)
And if you still feel like throwing your Christmas or a family member to the curb, remember that Matthew West summed it up best by saying while you can’t pick your family because God already did that for you; we can still have each other and make special memories even with the dysfunctional family Christmas.
The Rev. Dr. Cynthia Taylor, is a retired Episcopal Priest and full-time animal lover.
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