I had something entirely different on my mind to write for today – something that God has been sharing with me in the last few days. However, I was sitting in church Sunday in the glow of Christmas lights and advent candles when God dropped something else on my heart for this Christmas week.
I found myself sitting there as special music played thinking about people I miss. Oh, there’s the obvious. I miss my parents and other friends and family that have passed away. It’s an acute feeling of loss on many days during the holiday season, especially at Christmas.
I began reflecting on people that used to attend church with me that no longer do for whatever reason. I thought about friends and people I grew up and went to school with. What a mark those people can leave on your life, especially because you know them during your formative years.
I thought about former coworkers who suffered with me through many dreadful meetings, angry phone calls, and leadership changes. They also practically lived some of my highest highs and lowest lows right along with me. And I with them. It’s hard not to still be close to people that you know so much about. When you know how they take their coffee, what their childbirth experiences were, and just what pushes their buttons it’s hard to not still be close to them.
Then there are people who are with you in certain phases of life but go their separate ways when it’s over. Specifically, college friends, former neighbors, daycare staff that felt more like family and people that are close during a sports season or some similar activity all come to mind.
Finally, I think about friends that just go different directions. Friends that have small children at different times than you and lifestyles that simply no longer match up. Priorities change. Sometimes life just takes us in different directions. Other times we put too many expectations on friends and they just can’t live up to them. So we drift apart.
I miss all of these people in my life. That is one perk of social media, the ability to still have some connection with many of these people. However, a bird’s eye view of someone’s life is never going to take the place of real and regular connection. That has felt so significant this year. Connecting with people. Right now, I’m certainly missing the real time normally spent with family and friends that I don’t get to see this Christmas.
As those thoughts, and so many of those faces, crossed my mind with rapid speed, that’s when it happened. God pointed me to the Christmas story and the one person that we never have to miss. Jesus. I was overwhelmed in that moment thinking about the gift that He was, is and will continue to be. We can argue semantics of the story often presented to us in songs, church plays and Nativity sets, but we can’t argue His birth and the good news it meant for all of humanity.
“Then the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid, for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:10-11, NKJV)
Friends, unlike all the other people in our lives that don’t live up to our expectations, pass through like ships in the night, pass on to eternity, or just drift away, Jesus Christ remains with us. He will not leave us. He will not let us down. He will not drift away because the circumstances of our life changed. He loves you, and He will not stop.
Jesus is enough. Let me say it again, Jesus is enough. He is the only person that will never leave us or forsake us. He is the only one who can fully and permanently fill the void in our hearts. We were made to need Him. No one else – not spouses, not children, not parents, not friends – can fill what only He can. What a gift.
This Christmas when you see a Nativity scene, read the events of Christ’s birth in the book of Luke, or even listen to Linus recite it in “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” I want you to take to heart those good tidings of great joy. The Savior, who is Christ the Lord, was born for you. Once you ask Him into your heart, He is always with you. He is always enough.
