I know it happens every year, but this year it seems like a rampant disease around Christmas. To-do lists, pressure, exhaustion, and pure agony. Getting "ready" for Christmas has become less about preparing our hearts and WAY more about preparing for duties and responsibilities; making sure everything gets bought, and wrapped, and baked, and cleaned, and sent and woah- I am burned out just from merely trying to explain what most of us are actually experiencing. Christmas is all about celebrating new life-life that changed the world, but it's slowly sucking the life out of us all instead.
We're all so overwhelmed, so busy, so on the verge of breaking with no time to stop and reflect. This year, in the midst of chaos, I have been asking Jesus to remind me that I am His daughter. I have been sitting at his feet asking him to remind me that I am free. Because of his miraculous birth, life, and death- I am free. I am free from pressures and judgements and expectations. I am free from my tendancies to worship perfectionism and performance. Because of Jesus I am divorced from the sweet, yet tempting lies that His love is based on what I do or what I have done. Because He entered the world, I am seperated from the false comfort that anxiety brings- I don't have to hide anymore or overthink anymore or stress anymore. I already know what He thinks of me: I am His daughter. I can burn my to-do lists and I can smash the stack of bricks weighing me down. I can rest in knowing that He died to set me free from all of those messes. I can sigh deep and Celebrate that He came to earth through a woman- a woman who had to let go and trust. She had an unshakable faith in God's plan and because of her willingness to obey and because she laid down every worry and fear, God used her in an unfathomable way. She gave birth to the savior of the world.
I can celebrate His birth and life this Christmas. My heart is brimming over with thankfulness for the precious gift of salvation made available to all. Because He was born, I can rejoice. I was brought life and hope.
Often I still have one piece of my heart in the arms of Jesus and the other piece trying desperately to cling to the false comforts of the world. I know the truth, but sometimes it is scary to fully believe and submit and let it change me.
I am not interested in a life that isn't fully submitted. The concept of knowing about the life-changing love and grace of Jesus, but not letting it penetrate deep enough into my heart to radically change my life, terrifies and me altogether disgusts me. It's not enough to simply know and hear about the Christmas story- to know the stories of His life and death. I want those truths to change me to the core, to completely uproot the life I think I can build on my own efforts. I want the unexplainable and completely unmerited compassion, grace, and mercy to hit me like a freight train and remold my whole life, how I view each moment, and how I value others. I'm not interested in a cute, pretty telling of His life and birth- I want the whole radical truth of who He is and what He's done-overflowing into all that I do.
"We have been born into a new life that cannot be destroyed or corrupted and can't fade away." -1 Peter 1:4
So with that, I challenge you this Christmas, and at the same time I challenge myself, to not crumble under the unrealistic pressures and expectations of this season. Instead lets breathe deeply of the peace that He brings and sing loudly about His remarkable birth that has freed us all.
