That Thing About Christmas

He asked me what Christmas was like when I was a kid. I had to pause and edit the plethora of possible answers into a brief summary. 

After a moment I told my grandson that, first and foremost, I recalled that Christmas was much simpler in the fifties. No one even spoke of the coming season until after Thanksgiving. There were no decorations in the stores or on the streets until about mid-December. But of course that was before The Great Force of Commerce had taken the helm and steered the ship into a new direction.

We discussed ever morphing societal change and how things evolve and often at the center of great change is economic in nature.

Later, after our home schooling for the day was done, I sat and reflected on our discussion. So many Christmases in my history of 72 years. Almost recallable as though reading a book - each era of my life recounted as though in a separate chapter. Good years, not so good years, prosperous years, lean and sometimes frighteningly difficult years. I’ve seen them all. I’ve lived them all. Traditions begun and then softly abandoned over time to be replaced by others as children grew up and brought home new additions to the tribe. 

As I reminisced, trying to recall all the best years, I discovered that my most vivid memories were of those when times were tough and I was forced to soldier on to make the holiday as good as possible for the ones I loved. Thus, all the best Christmases are swirled together into a single sparkling blur, like a galaxy far away. I’d be hard pressed to identify a specific year or moment that stood out. Conversely I can recite the details of all the times I had to simply make it work and smile as though nothing was wrong. 

In summary, I told my grandson that Christmas comes anyway, no matter what is going on in your life. Just like the residents of Whoville, upon waking to the destruction the Grinch had committed, they gathered around in the town square and sang praises to the One they celebrated on that day.

That true thing about Christmas is that it can never be taken over by any commercialization. It stands alone, with no need for any human decorating or dressing up. It comes even if you are  sitting in a trench on a battlefield. 

Because…

Christmas isn’t about traditions or customs. Christmas is about Christ. That He came, as a babe in the lowliest of circumstances. That He is our gift, our reason for standing in spite of the noticeable great growing opposition to the faith and reason for the season. 

But regardless, just as you can pray anywhere, and no one can stop you, Christmas is something you can celebrate in your heart 24/7/365.

Merry Christmas! No matter what your circumstances this year, may your hearts be light and grateful. 

For Him,

Meema

The Not So New Selfie Age

It’s been a slow boil, a subtle building up, so slight as to be unnoticeable, that it’s practically impossible to pinpoint how it has come to this. Perhaps it was a collective of conditions that have brought us to the narcissistic world of self-absorption and promotion. No doubt social media and cell phones with professional quality cameras have moved us further faster than the days of glamorous magazines and humanistic Live Your Best Life - You’re Okay/I’m Okay gurus could ever have. 

The question is begged though… have we reached the point of no return? What would it take to stop the madness? Is there a reset button? When will we see it’s time to slam on the brakes? Are we destined to end up crashing and bursting into flames? Will we have to be ‘blinded lest we see’? (John 12:40)

I have no answers to those disturbing questions. All I know is that self-focus, self-centeredness is epidemic and, even worse, is embraced and accepted as the new norm. We are mentored and encouraged to be ever cognizant of our emotional temperature, the health of our internal state of being, which has fostered a societal demand for constant self-assuring, self-inspiring, self-loving to hedge against self-loathing. 

Not surprisingly, self-focus has become a vehicle for promoting what seems, in a worldly view, to be what I have often referred to as Good for Goodness Sake illusion, a great pretender, a substitute goodness that fusses and flurries and dresses itself up to replace genuine Godly goodness. 

Ironic, isn’t it, that if we were properly focused on Godly good, we would be completely redirected away from the need to be identified with self-good.

Unlike SELF goodness, Real Deal Godly Goodness is usually unnoticeable, mostly goes undetected. More often than not it’s a simple gesture of self-sacrifice, performed anonymously, a stepping up to do a menial task, a charitable gesture given with no fanfare, no applause expected. No glamour. No need for illustration with a self-portrait broadcast across all media. 

Narcissism isn’t all that difficult to recognize as such but there is an updated twist to the evolution of self-as-center that seems to me to be a bit more sinister and perhaps even more dangerous. When I see what appears to be good sounding ‘Christian’ concept words presented with a well-crafted selfie I have to wonder what the real point is. I instantly sense an unseen agenda.

Obsession with SELF is not new but rather an ancient device used by that old deceiver and is successful because it appeals to the immature flesh craving to be noticed and approved of, which leaves little room for looking out and up. Narcissism is addressed in the Bible in Paul’s second pastoral epistle to Timothy (2 Timothy 3:1-7).  Paul questions the character and behavior of leaders within the church, so he warns Timothy to beware of those who act out of a “self love attitude” and says, “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come. For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.  And from such people turn away.”  

Oswald Chambers addressed the issue specific to those who seek applause for ‘good works’:

…whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. —1 Corinthians 10:31

In the Scriptures, the great miracle of the incarnation slips into the ordinary life of a child; the great miracle of the transfiguration fades into the demon-possessed valley below; the glory of the resurrection descends into a breakfast on the seashore. This is not an anticlimax, but a great revelation of God.

We have a tendency to look for wonder in our experience, and we mistake heroic actions for real heroes. It’s one thing to go through a crisis grandly, yet quite another to go through every day glorifying God when there is no witness, no limelight, and no one paying even the remotest attention to us. If we are not looking for halos, we at least want something that will make people say, “What a wonderful man of prayer he is!” or, “What a great woman of devotion she is!” If you are properly devoted to the Lord Jesus, you have reached the lofty height where no one would ever notice you personally. All that is noticed is the power of God coming through you all the time.

We want to be able to say, “Oh, I have had a wonderful call from God!” But to do even the most humbling tasks to the glory of God takes the Almighty God Incarnate working in us. To be utterly unnoticeable requires God’s Spirit in us making us absolutely humanly His. The true test of a saint’s life is not successfulness but faithfulness on the human level of life. We tend to set up success in Christian work as our purpose, but our purpose should be to display the glory of God in human life, to live a life “hidden with Christ in God” in our everyday human conditions (Colossians 3:3). Our human relationships are the very conditions in which the ideal life of God should be exhibited.

See? Selfie not required.

For Him,

Meema

On Being Irrelevant

On Being Irrelevant

Due to cyclical drought, our pond is a low as I’ve ever seen it in the 12 years we’ve lived on ‘The Funny Farm’. It fell about five feet during the drought of 2008, a year after we acquired this unique fourteen acre patch of earth, which was a cause for great concern.  Of course, we were only seeing it, based on our new eyes perspective, as it was in that moment, fostered by our lack of experience. I personally fretted over it, prayed about it and worried about the pond inhabitants, as though I had been appointed the official Pond Overseer. 

Eventually the rains came back and the pond filled quickly and the fish, turtles, herons, geese, ducks and things I don’t know about, carried on as though nothing had happened.

Over the past eleven years, the pond has stayed fairly level, with only occasional dips below full pool. Then, this year, after a long rainy winter/spring, the rains stopped again and the pond slowly began to recede. What is different this time, though, is my lack of concern. I’m just not.

But why?

Well, for one thing, I am older, which means I am tired in general but also I’m weary of fretting over things, especially things I have no control over, things that have managed to survive through all manner of crisis, whether I am fretting or not. This pond has been here, rising and falling with the natural cycles of wet and dry since it was formed as a cow tank in the early 50s for the real farm of  which this once was a functional part. Thus it has history, it has a ‘before me’ life and rhythm that flicks me in the category of irrelevant like I was a gnat. 

However, at age 72, after wrestling with the inevitable for a couple of years, I find being irrelevant is a huge blessing. Even though a decade ago I was still fighting the fight, resisting the concept of declining, of retiring, of becoming unnecessary, of striving to maintain, I’ve now passed through another threshold and I’ve not only made peace with this new paradigm, I realize what freedoms I now can enjoy.

For example:

• I can’t fix the world but I don’t have to.
• I can’t leave this earthly plane with all my kids perfectly aligned in their lives.
• I don’t have to speak my opinion anymore. Who cares? 
• I don’t have to fret about what the world thinks of me - only what God thinks.
• I don’t have to decorate for a season. The seasons are amazingly temporary.
• I don’t have to look good for my age. >BIG ONE<

Now it’s okay for me to be exactly who I am, warts and all, instead of trying to be what this illusion-based culture, women’s magazines, AARP, social media, and botoxed, ancient movie stars redesigned by plastic surgery, think I should be. No nude photos to prove I still have it are necessary.

This old pond, then, is analogous to how I see the sum of my life. The importance of what and who I have been as well as who I am, is mostly below the surface, unseen by anyone else but God. I served my purpose, with no need for recognition, fanfare or applause. I survived all manner of tribulation through the grace of God who owns and controls everything. The world will go on, no better no worse, when I bid adieu. What is there to fret over? 

My oldest granddaughter wrote a poem in high school as we had only just begun to discover the somewhat anomalous life on a pond. I read it now and see a bigger picture. Funny how even old eyes can see with new perspective. 

As I type this, the rains have returned and the pond is rising. 

“But when the fury and the flash is done, they carry on with what they have begun.”

For Him,

Meema