Be Open: To Christmas Being Different

Favourite decorations, traditions, activities, and of course – foods! Some of the best things about Christmas are the ones that carry through from year to year, some even from our childhood. So what happens in our holly-bedecked hearts when things change – and change big time?

In early September I received a call from my orthopedic surgeon’s office that a spot had opened up for surgery the following Friday. I had been waiting so long, so I accepted the spot, knowing I had nine days to prepare to be off my feet for 12 weeks.

Among the many things to accomplish was doing some Christmas decorating. Our son, daughter-in-law and another daughter celebrate together on the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend in an extravaganza called Thankbirthmas where we celebrate all our birthdays, Christmas and Thanksgiving. The girls graciously offered to do the cooking, but we HAD to have the tree up.

So my hubby schlepped up one of our three trees and our memory ornaments as well as another bin or two of decor and we decorated the living room. That is all there was time for. Hurrying didn’t help my perfectionist self. It would absolutely have to do. First lesson learned!

Surgery went well and after a week I was able to be helped from the bed to the recliner. Menus were discussed with the girls and shopping had to be done online as my hero of a husband cared for me, ran the house, worked full-time, made meals and prepped and led Sunday worship services.

I love to spoil the kids when they come and we often take a walk together. None of this happened as it had in the past. It was settling in my mind that Christmas was going to be very different this year.

I’m healing well, and hopefully will get the all clear to return to more normal duties by mid-December. It’s not realistic that I will be able to do the decorating, baking, shopping and visiting that normally happens. I have a choice to make. I can take a negative attitude of self-pity or depression. I can poise myself for exhaustion by attempting to throw it all together in a week and likely end up short-tempered and resentful.

Or, I can chose to adopt the goal that my mother shared with me in a recent text. She wrote, ” My goal is to enjoy what this celebration is really about.”

Of course, I know that Christmas means a whole lot more than Christmas lights, Nana’s Christmas pudding and a house decked to the corners. I don’t think it’s wrong to decorate, bake, watch Christmas movies and give gifts of love. But maybe this year Jesus is inviting me to be open to sitting back with time to pour over the love letter of Luke chapters 1 and 2, to remember loved ones and special Christmases of years past. To be grateful for what I do have, enjoying my tree that I have all day to sit near and sing songs that celebrate the greatest Gift – the one that fits me perfectly and was bought with an immeasurable price.

No forest of tinseled trees, no immense Christmas village, not even a light display that can be seen from space can equal what has been given.

So yes, I’m open to a different Christmas. I am open to the love of my husband, my family and friends helping with the things I cannot do. I am open to a season of not rushing around tired with an endless to-do list. I am open to looking at my neighbours’ brightly lit houses from my window if my porch is bare. I am open to a store-bought cookies. I am open to one Christmas tree. And I’m open to Jesus, who is with me always and loves me best.