About ten years ago, I hit a major funk. All fall I was struggling--emotionally, physically, spiritually. And few things are worse than Christmas-time in funkland.
When you're in funkland during Christmas, everyone seems happy. Everyone's telling you to be of good cheer. You just want to shout, "don your own stinkin' gay apparel!" and running and hiding in a quiet place away from away from everyone.
On top of that, I was (and am) a religious professional! Christmas is supposed to be my big day, my prime time!
I had tried everything I knew to do to re-connect with the Lord: reading new books, re-reading old books, Scripture, prayer, journaling, fasting, all of it. Nothing doing.
I remember my wife and I were visiting my parents and we were coming home from a Christmas Eve service where I was once again reminded of how spiritually vacuous I was. I was in the back seat of my parents car (feeling like I was nine all over again) once again disappointed in myself and God who seemed to be doing nothing to give a brother a break...not even at Christmas time.
I remember praying in the midst of my disappointment: "God, I've done everything I know to do to get out of this hard place. Nothing has worked. Do you think that you could come to get me?"
And then it hit me. A bright, piercing ray of light in a dark place. God did come to get me. That's what Christmas is all about. That's what this whole Christianity thing is all about. It's not about performance-management, crisis-management, doing more of some things, doing less of other things, it's not about warm-fuzzies or happy days or sad days. It's not about any of that stuff.
Christmas is the good news of a God who has come to get us when we could not "get" ourselves. We couldn't get ourselves out of the spiritual death that we were stuck in. So God himself has come. He has come to get us.
If you're experiencing Christmas in funkland this year, I'm praying for you, even as I write this note. There's just know way around it: it's harder to be struggling during the holidays...and the holidays can take a hard place and make it infinitely worse.
But know this: God coming to get us, to rescue us from permanent funkland is what Christmas is all about.
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