I am sure I am not alone in this. Holidays are exciting for some and tough for others. For those who foresee the holidays as being a tough time, how do you plan on handling it?
On Thanksgiving, many of us stuff our faces with turkey, dressing and pumpkin pie. The excitement continued by watching a football game or two.
Then many of us continued the day by visiting family and friends and discussing the great things that are happening as well as reminiscing about the good old days when Christmas shopping didn’t begin the day after Thanksgiving. After all, people back in our day, waited until December to shop for Christmas.
Then there are others who dread the holidays. Even though Thanksgiving is now behind us, Christmas is coming.
There are a lot of reasons people dread the holidays. For some, it represents having to come to terms with a lost loved one who you lost recently, who will not take their usual seat at the dinner table. You will miss their smiling face this year.
Others will encounter different problems. Maybe it’s not a lost loved one, but a job loss, a health challenge, a complicated relationship or a financial downturn. Whatever the adversity is, Christmas won’t be the same.
Is there a remedy for this? For the Christian, I believe there is.
Some might try to stuff their feelings, while others seek to vent them to someone else. However, I think there is a third option.
Take your struggle to God and surrender the situation to him. Surrendering involves living out an intimate connection with God. But it is more than just sharing your heart with him. It is finding the inner rest that comes from knowing that Jesus is satisfied with you because you have fully embraced what he has done on the cross for you.
The remedy also requires taking on the right attitude, and that attitude is gratitude. Gratitude is a feeling of happiness or contentment that comes from being appreciative of what one has.
It also involves fully recognizing God’s sovereignty and providential care. Knowing God’s care for us helps us to be grateful in whatever situation we find ourselves because we see God’s hand at work in our position. This truth is what led C.S. Lewis to say, “Gratitude exclaims, very properly, ‘How good of God to give me this.’” This disposition helps to find satisfaction in whatever situation we find ourselves.
It’s not natural to feel grateful when we are struggling. That’s when you need to take action to attain a sense of gratitude. The action required is thanksgiving. Gratitude comes when we are thankful for what we have and reject the temptation to be preoccupied with what we don’t have.
In the face of tough times, like having endured a holiday without our lost loved one, we should praise God for the blessings we have now, and not merely for the blessings we once enjoyed.
Here, I appeal to John Newton for help. Newton served as a captain on slave ships when he found Christ. He later renounced this trade when he experienced salvation. Newton later penned the famous hymn “Amazing Grace.” The opening verse reveals his encounter with God’s grace when he states, “Amazing grace/How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me/I once was lost, but now am found/Was blind, but now I see.
Through accepting Jesus’ death on the cross as punishment for our sins, Newton also points out that “the Lord afflicts us at times, but it is always a thousand times less than we deserve, and much less than many of our fellow-creatures are suffering around us. Let us, therefore, pray for grace to be … thankful.”
Sometimes God allows difficult circumstances so we will be broken and depend on the shepherd. When those circumstances come, it is essential to know that God is the Good Shepherd who cares for his sheep, protects his sheep, feeds his sheep and works on their behalf, especially in the hard times.
Thank him for being your good shepherd, even if you don’t feel like it. Do it by faith. Do it consistently.
Before long, God will replace the feeling of emptiness with gratitude.
Tim Orr of Columbus is an author and an adjunct faculty member in religious studies at IUPUC, where he has served for more than 10 years. His writing reflects his 20-plus years working with a variety of cultures. His website is TimOrr.net.
