The Christmas Song
Chestnuts roasting on an open fire,
Jack Frost nipping at your nose,
Yuletide carols being sung by a choir,
And folks dressed up like Eskimos.
If there’s one song that has the “Christmas Spirit” it’s this one. It makes us
think of a scene from a Norman Rockwell painting. Or maybe we imagine carolers
coming to our doors while we offer them some tasty, mulled apple cider fresh off
the stove. We attend parties at friends’ houses and services at church. Let’s
not forget about being all bundled up on Christmas morning with our families
while the most beautiful snowflakes fall to the ground.
And then in the midst of our Christmas illusions, our children storm into the
room yelling “Mom!” or “Dad!” because someone hit them, or because one of them
use the other’s pellet gun without asking, or because one of the neighbors took
their basketball away, or because they fell off the zip line. Oh, for the love
of all that is good and right in the world, can we not stay in our little piece
of Christmas paradise just a tad bit longer?
That’s life, isn’t it? No matter how perfect we try to paint the canvas of our
lives, there will always be something extra put on it that wasn’t in our minds
when we dreamed it. Something that cramps our perfect picture. Something that
breaks our heart.
A relationship that ended.
A loved one who died prematurely.
The betrayal of a friend.
Did you know that God isn’t surprised by the interruptions in our lives? In
fact, nothing surprises Him. Don’t mistake bad things happening in your life as
His loss of control. No, this is not about His ability but about His
sovereignty.
While we may wish that bad things would never happen in our lives, they will
happen. Jesus said we’d have trouble (John 16:33), but He also promised that
He’d calm us in the midst of it (John 14:16). So, no matter where we are in
life, whether we expected to be on the path we are on or not, rest assured, that
our God can make broken things beautiful.