What Christmas celebration stands out in your mind? Is is a certain tradition? Is it a certain gift? Is it a certain person/group of people?
Last year I had a Christmas celebration that sits more fondly in my mind than most. It was like nothing I had ever done before: no gifts, no church service, none of the "usual" people, one person I hardly knew, and one person I had never before met.
Four of the people there were family: one aunt, and three cousins. No uncle. No dad/mom. Through an unfortunate series of events I ended up at this house for Christmas eve. First there was the divorce. Then some eight years later I moved in with my dad. Then the next year I moved in with my sister, and finally ended up at my Aunt and Uncle's. Then a separation turned it from my Aunt and Uncle's to my Aunt's. We were brought together by brokenness.
Then the two strangers: both people who worked with my Aunt, but each person from the other of the two jobs my Aunt worked. The first lived with us for a time. She had just gotten a divorce, and had nowhere really to go. She told me later that this Christmas was so strange because nobody was drunk... that had been all she knew until this Christmas. The second was going to be alone for Christmas. She and her mom had gotten into a fight, and her mom went up north to be with family without her. She didn't even have a car. All seven of us were brought together by brokenness.
Seven broken people, with broken pasts leading them to the oddest of Christmas dinners. We sat down to an impressive meal, and enjoyed talking and story telling. For some reason, every single person in that house fit together, we became some oddly assorted family. We laughed more than I had for a long time. We did not exchange any gifts, or go to a Christmas eve service. We simply spent time together, and enjoyed each other. We forgot about our pasts and our presents, and we just existed together.
The love that was in that house was sonorous and tangible like a Beethoven symphony.
With love for all on this Holiday season, my hope is for every person to get a moment to spend with people. Maybe not the people you had hoped for, maybe not the people you could have possibly guessed, but just people. And I hope that everyone can enjoy a moment of love similar to mine.
Merry, happy, blessed ChristmaKwanzaaHanukkah to all.
