a holiday season prayer

I’m sitting in the airport in Atlanta – delayed. I’ve just been “home” for 4 days, visiting family – finally getting to be a close-up Aunt instead of a far-away Aunt. Having Thanksgiving dinner with most of my family. Celebrating an early Christmas with most of my family. It’s always times like these that make me realize exactly how hard it is to live my life.

Granted, I’m not in any major danger. I don’t put my life on the line daily. There are MANY nobler jobs than mine. But I do live a day’s drive away from my family. And for a nuclear family girl like myself, that’s hard. It seems to get harder every time I see my parents, my sisters, my brothers-in-law, my nieces and my nephews. My nieces and nephews always have these new little nuances that have shown up in their personalities. It’s always time to go right as they’re opening up to me – as they’re welcoming me into their lives. And that is hard.

I’m in Atlanta and there are people rushing past me – business people, family people, military people, kids, moms, dads, grandmas, grandpas, friends – you get the picture. There’s a pilot sitting directly across from me and my first thought wasn’t, “Wow, I wonder if he enjoys his job?” My first thought was, “I wonder when he last got to spend quality time with his family?” Why is it that the Holiday Season always brings thoughts of families to mind? We’re always more open to helping others during a season when we realize exactly how good we have it. Why does it take us being bombarded with images of what we have for us to realize that there are others who desperately need our help?

And then there’s me – guilty of all of this. I only think of those “less fortunate” than I am when I’m lonely. Or when I’m in an airport. What kind of hypocrite am I that I sit at home, enjoying the warmth of my many blankets while sitting on the couch, watching old movies on my flat screen TV that I had to have to replace the one the movers broken when I moved to Florida? I’m afraid I’ve totally bought into the American mentality of “I need, I need, I need” instead of “I want, I want, I want.” Because, to be honest, who needs multiple TV’s? Who needs a nice computer, a nice phone, multiple music players and a mostly new car? These are just wants.

Here’s my prayer for the Holiday Season:

“Father God, take away my desire for those things I don’t need. Teach me the difference between a need and a desire. Instead, turn that desire towards what I can do for others – for those who actually need: for those who go without daily so that their children might be able to eat. Holy Spirit, build a fire in my soul for those who hurt, for those who so desperately need to know you when I am so blessed to have been given so much by you.

God, thank you for what you’ve given me. I’ve received an overabundance of gifts from you – help me to use them for Your glory. You are an awesome God and I want to live to serve You.

Amen.”

a new spin on this holiday season

It seems like I always take a break from writing until something tragic happens to me or my family. Well, this situation is no different. I haven’t written about this situation because, frankly, it’s just too painful - to think about, to have to live through, to even consider as the possibility that it is really happening.

It’s the Holiday Season, right? A time for perpetual cheer, good will, all that jazz. But I ask you, how can I be happy when my family unit, as I know it, is forever changed? My family will never celebrate a holiday together again - no birthdays, no weddings, no holidays, nothing.

I’m headed home on Tuesday to be the “comforter” through this tough time for my family. It seems like it’s a roll I can’t seem to switch off. I hate seeing people hurting, especially if those people are my family. It just sucks that there is absolutely nothing I can do about it but just sit there and watch everyone hurt (me included).

Someone really screwed up. My family will bounce back from this, but it’ll take a REALLY long time. We’re all experiencing emotions we’re not used to feeling. I, personally, am feeling every negative emotion known to man, thrown in with a little compassion & concern. It’s an odd combination - to want to hurt someone yet feel bad for them, even love them.

I don’t think there’s any way to convey exactly what I’m feeling. This is a different kind of hurt, concern, despair than I’ve ever felt before in my life. It’s an experience I can’t put into words. It’s one of those things that, while I’m not thinking about it, life seems normal. But when I do think about it, it’s like my entire world is coming to an end. The innocence that was once synonymous with my family is forever gone. How I long for the days when the worst thing I could expect to go through was moving (leaving everyone I love), ending a relationship or losing something. I want those days back. I want my family as I knew it back.

Sadly, that will never happen. This Holiday Season is the beginning of a new phase of life - an unwelcome, unwanted phase of life. It’s kind of a phase of mourning, yet one of growing closer as the new family unit that we are. They say that God doesn’t give you anything you can’t handle. He gives you what you need to grow. I hate to sound sacrilegious, but if this is what it takes, I’d rather not grow in this area of my life.

I found a Bible verse during church today that I’ve obviously read before (because I underlined it), but I don’t really remember ever having really seen it before. It’s 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 (NLT):

7…even though I have received such wonderful revelations from God. So to keep me from becoming proud, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger from Satan to torment me and keep me from becoming proud.

8 Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away. 9 Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. 10 That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

I think that this situation, this crisis, is the thorn in my side - in my family’s side. I can’t count how many times I’ve asked God to take this situation away - to let my family go back in time and find a way to stop what happened. But He won’t, and we can’t. I guess all I can do is just truck on through this newfound sadness, this apparent weakness, and learn to lean on God.

Maybe that’s the spin on this Holiday Season - everyone remembers that Jesus came as a baby to save the world. It seems like a much different story when you see how hard and ugly that world can be. I guess those verses need to become my life verses for the time being - until I can learn to welcome this ever-so-painful thorn in my side.