" If that is the actual gospel, I think I could stick around on the edges of this forever." is what I have been telling myself over and over these days. Thank goodness for kind and tender fellow travelers.
I am navigating Christmas this year with an ache in my chest. We have not attended church all year but as Christmas rolls around I am desperate for candlelight and hymns. We are going to be visiting some challenging family for Christmas and I desperately don't want their church to be our only experience this year. I have such a hard time with church during the rest of the year, but this time just gets me and I come crawling back to the rituals I've set aside the rest of the year. My favorite song is O Come O Come Emmanuel. That's the one that when it is sung I finally feel a little lighter in my chest.
"There is something between everything and nothing." Yes, yes. This is my deconstruction experience. I have multiple sanctuaries: My car worshipping to KLove radio. My garden. My yoga, writing, and meditation room. My heart. I no longer go to church, but I hold the Divine just as tightly as it holds me. And yes, O Holy Night is my favorite as well.
All this resonates so very much! Simple traditions that children want to continue are the best! I loved the Little Bear reference. My oldest grandson, who is now a US diplomat, once told me I reminded him of Mother Bear. It remains one of the best compliments in my life! <3 Merry Christmas to you and yours!
I am terribly ambivalent about what I believe, in general, and I've found it exhausting to try and figure it out. At the end of the day, I believe God just doesn't really care if we believe "the right things" but, rather, calls us to be and do the right thing. But, there is just something about a candlelit, cozy sanctuary filled with sacred voices at Christmas. I'm learning to accept it for the gift that it is. Merry Christmas to you and your family, Sarah. I thank you for sharing your gifts.
I am deep in the weeds of figuring out what is precious to me with my own tinies at Christmas and this is exactly what I needed to read today. Thank you.
I loved this essay. After 3.5 years away from church.... a season where SO much has changed, I committed to dipping my toes back into church waters for the 4 weeks of Advent. It's been hard and good. I have found myself weeping unexpectedly --- the pain resurfacing from who knows where. BUT, rather than run from it, I am sitting with it and recommitting to returning each week.
I don't know nearly as much as I thought I did. I am also not nearly as certain as I used to be, BUT... I do know I am loved by God, His Son and I still hear His Spirit and for now that is enough.
I’m a minister who has served in congregational ministry for 20 years. My faith has grown and transformed over the years. My love of Christmas runs deep - every year I get teary as I share the news how God came to be WITH us - Emmanuel. Every year - tears. This year I find myself diagnosed with an infected gallbladder, awaiting surgery, unsure if I can lead worship. I’m frustrated and disappointed and upset. As I read this message, looking at my own tree filled with ornaments and memories, my heart was healed a bit. Thank you for this. Thank you.
Beautiful writing. I really want to believe in a God like this but am having a hard time with it...and not sure what to do with it. But I'm enjoying writing like this :)
Christmas is ALL THE FEELS for me, and you nailed it: the music and the traditions and the rituals. My former husband and former SIL and I sang in so many Christmas Eve church services, under so many directors (even with John Michael Talbot one year!) that the music of Christmas, just a couple of notes, brings happy memories flooding. Happy times that were occurring quite often in the midst of scary times of no money, mental illness, dysfunction, or anger, but the music almost always helped me focus on what was important and gave me hope that I could find a way forward. And my two kids are grown now and have their own families, and I divorced their dad three years ago and he died suddenly last year, so there are new feelings swirling around us as we forge ahead and I add a new husband and a new family to the lump of dough. But, like me, my kids make room for our timeworn traditions (no Rutter Christmas music or John Denver and the Muppets until the day after Thanksgiving, but then, ON LOOP….the mousie in the walnut ornament front and center on the tree in Seattle) and my husband and I string popcorn and cranberries for our own tree. And I get a little weepy listening to the music…but they’re happy, hopeful tears.
This is where I am this Christmas. I haven’t been to church in about a year but my husband does go, with a child or two or sometimes alone. This Advent I’ve continued to light our four candles and read the advent devotions from Kate Bowler’s Have a Beautiful, Terrible Day out loud at dinner. The words are both familiar, sinking back into the groove, and strange in my mouth, do I really believe this? Am I putting on a show? Do I just hope I believe it?
We will go to the Christmas Eve service. My husband offered to go elsewhere, perhaps a more liturgical church, but the kids want to go to … ours? His? Their church?
I want to throw it all out, but I don’t. I want to have nothing to do with it, but I can’t.
Thank you for the line “It’s okay to take some things with you.”
Let the ugly crying commence… I’ll be journaling on this one for sure.
My song I have clung to for literal years is O Come Emmanuel. Something about the mournful lines being sung from the place of exile felt metaphorically honest to me. And the idea of repeatedly asking Emmanuel to come to me - when the whole idea of that very name is that God is with us already - felt fitting. “I can call you Emmanuel with the hope that you are but I also need to ask you to come here since you just feel so far still. I believe - help my unbelief.”
Oh my goodness, of all the meaningful things in this essay, you stopped me in my tracks about “Little Bear” being a show! My youngest is in kindergarten, and for years we’ve had memorized the original beautiful 1950s vintage copy from his father, who is older. We even found a cozy stuffed animal that looked just like Little Bear. When we were all nervous about him starting preschool, I ordered him a nap mat for school. I couldn’t believe my eyes when the random Amazon product had a video with our exact plush Little Bear demonstrating via stop-motion video how to use and snuggle into the nap mat. Well, once our son saw the nap mat was good enough for Little Bear, all of his (our!) worries about preK disappeared, and he never looked back. I cannot wait to check out the show.
Wow, so many emotions while reading this one! I grew up with the magazine-perfect Christmas tree, but was never allowed to help decorate it. So reading about your little ones getting to work with you in such a wholesome, warm tradition made me tear up--in awe that families like yours exist, and in sadness for my connection-starved childhood. Like you, Christmas hymns and rituals make cracks in my heart that Christ comes through. In all my years as an angry atheist, I never could resist Christmas carols, and participating in an Advent season at a grace-forward church played a key role in my coming back to faith. And like you, I can never get through O Holy Night without tears (and I'm not a crier). Heading off this year on a big trip over Christmas with a beloved younger family member, and I'd been debating whether or not to try to squeeze in a Christmas Eve or Christmas Day church service. This essay has decided me--bring on the cathedrals and the choirs! Healing doesn't mean throwing it all away. <3
" If that is the actual gospel, I think I could stick around on the edges of this forever." is what I have been telling myself over and over these days. Thank goodness for kind and tender fellow travelers.
I am navigating Christmas this year with an ache in my chest. We have not attended church all year but as Christmas rolls around I am desperate for candlelight and hymns. We are going to be visiting some challenging family for Christmas and I desperately don't want their church to be our only experience this year. I have such a hard time with church during the rest of the year, but this time just gets me and I come crawling back to the rituals I've set aside the rest of the year. My favorite song is O Come O Come Emmanuel. That's the one that when it is sung I finally feel a little lighter in my chest.
"There is something between everything and nothing." Yes, yes. This is my deconstruction experience. I have multiple sanctuaries: My car worshipping to KLove radio. My garden. My yoga, writing, and meditation room. My heart. I no longer go to church, but I hold the Divine just as tightly as it holds me. And yes, O Holy Night is my favorite as well.
All this resonates so very much! Simple traditions that children want to continue are the best! I loved the Little Bear reference. My oldest grandson, who is now a US diplomat, once told me I reminded him of Mother Bear. It remains one of the best compliments in my life! <3 Merry Christmas to you and yours!
So good. Trying to figure out what to keep and what to evolve and what to let go of is a continual process, which is both beautiful and exhausting
I am terribly ambivalent about what I believe, in general, and I've found it exhausting to try and figure it out. At the end of the day, I believe God just doesn't really care if we believe "the right things" but, rather, calls us to be and do the right thing. But, there is just something about a candlelit, cozy sanctuary filled with sacred voices at Christmas. I'm learning to accept it for the gift that it is. Merry Christmas to you and your family, Sarah. I thank you for sharing your gifts.
I am deep in the weeds of figuring out what is precious to me with my own tinies at Christmas and this is exactly what I needed to read today. Thank you.
so glad to hear that, Rebecca, thank you!
I loved this essay. After 3.5 years away from church.... a season where SO much has changed, I committed to dipping my toes back into church waters for the 4 weeks of Advent. It's been hard and good. I have found myself weeping unexpectedly --- the pain resurfacing from who knows where. BUT, rather than run from it, I am sitting with it and recommitting to returning each week.
I don't know nearly as much as I thought I did. I am also not nearly as certain as I used to be, BUT... I do know I am loved by God, His Son and I still hear His Spirit and for now that is enough.
I’m a minister who has served in congregational ministry for 20 years. My faith has grown and transformed over the years. My love of Christmas runs deep - every year I get teary as I share the news how God came to be WITH us - Emmanuel. Every year - tears. This year I find myself diagnosed with an infected gallbladder, awaiting surgery, unsure if I can lead worship. I’m frustrated and disappointed and upset. As I read this message, looking at my own tree filled with ornaments and memories, my heart was healed a bit. Thank you for this. Thank you.
Beautiful writing. I really want to believe in a God like this but am having a hard time with it...and not sure what to do with it. But I'm enjoying writing like this :)
Christmas is ALL THE FEELS for me, and you nailed it: the music and the traditions and the rituals. My former husband and former SIL and I sang in so many Christmas Eve church services, under so many directors (even with John Michael Talbot one year!) that the music of Christmas, just a couple of notes, brings happy memories flooding. Happy times that were occurring quite often in the midst of scary times of no money, mental illness, dysfunction, or anger, but the music almost always helped me focus on what was important and gave me hope that I could find a way forward. And my two kids are grown now and have their own families, and I divorced their dad three years ago and he died suddenly last year, so there are new feelings swirling around us as we forge ahead and I add a new husband and a new family to the lump of dough. But, like me, my kids make room for our timeworn traditions (no Rutter Christmas music or John Denver and the Muppets until the day after Thanksgiving, but then, ON LOOP….the mousie in the walnut ornament front and center on the tree in Seattle) and my husband and I string popcorn and cranberries for our own tree. And I get a little weepy listening to the music…but they’re happy, hopeful tears.
This is where I am this Christmas. I haven’t been to church in about a year but my husband does go, with a child or two or sometimes alone. This Advent I’ve continued to light our four candles and read the advent devotions from Kate Bowler’s Have a Beautiful, Terrible Day out loud at dinner. The words are both familiar, sinking back into the groove, and strange in my mouth, do I really believe this? Am I putting on a show? Do I just hope I believe it?
We will go to the Christmas Eve service. My husband offered to go elsewhere, perhaps a more liturgical church, but the kids want to go to … ours? His? Their church?
I want to throw it all out, but I don’t. I want to have nothing to do with it, but I can’t.
Thank you for the line “It’s okay to take some things with you.”
Let the ugly crying commence… I’ll be journaling on this one for sure.
My song I have clung to for literal years is O Come Emmanuel. Something about the mournful lines being sung from the place of exile felt metaphorically honest to me. And the idea of repeatedly asking Emmanuel to come to me - when the whole idea of that very name is that God is with us already - felt fitting. “I can call you Emmanuel with the hope that you are but I also need to ask you to come here since you just feel so far still. I believe - help my unbelief.”
Oh my goodness, of all the meaningful things in this essay, you stopped me in my tracks about “Little Bear” being a show! My youngest is in kindergarten, and for years we’ve had memorized the original beautiful 1950s vintage copy from his father, who is older. We even found a cozy stuffed animal that looked just like Little Bear. When we were all nervous about him starting preschool, I ordered him a nap mat for school. I couldn’t believe my eyes when the random Amazon product had a video with our exact plush Little Bear demonstrating via stop-motion video how to use and snuggle into the nap mat. Well, once our son saw the nap mat was good enough for Little Bear, all of his (our!) worries about preK disappeared, and he never looked back. I cannot wait to check out the show.
Listened to this podcast that my mom sent me, and then read this piece. I hope whoever sees this has time to listen, I enjoyed them both so much. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hark-the-stories-behind-our-favorite-christmas-carols/id1595835931?i=1000638519404
Wow, so many emotions while reading this one! I grew up with the magazine-perfect Christmas tree, but was never allowed to help decorate it. So reading about your little ones getting to work with you in such a wholesome, warm tradition made me tear up--in awe that families like yours exist, and in sadness for my connection-starved childhood. Like you, Christmas hymns and rituals make cracks in my heart that Christ comes through. In all my years as an angry atheist, I never could resist Christmas carols, and participating in an Advent season at a grace-forward church played a key role in my coming back to faith. And like you, I can never get through O Holy Night without tears (and I'm not a crier). Heading off this year on a big trip over Christmas with a beloved younger family member, and I'd been debating whether or not to try to squeeze in a Christmas Eve or Christmas Day church service. This essay has decided me--bring on the cathedrals and the choirs! Healing doesn't mean throwing it all away. <3