I have a secret for you. Unfortunately, many people are very aware of this secret. The secret is...Christmas hurts. There are so many expectations that fly around our festivities. Some are easy to push aside and others are as tenacious as toenail fungus. I'm not sure when we as a people decided that Christmas should be a painless holiday. Was it the avalanche of stories about miracles of love found under the mistletoe? Could it be the sparkling eyes of kids ecstatic over the toys and fueled on cookies? I'm sure much of the anticipation and expectations are the twisted out growth of hope.
Hope is not the problem, of course, and neither is love. The problem is in the twisted part. Hope didn't come into the world blindly expecting all the best things. Hope left heaven with its incomprehensible splendor to be born as a baby in a stinking stable to an inexperienced mother. See, even the first Christmas was painful.
Christmas can hurt deeply. So many troubles pile on top of the expectations that everything should be joyful. Yes, there is joy. Joy that is more beautiful than a million trees dressed in millions of lights. There is hope. Hope that spawns movies with guaranteed happy endings and sustains those in terrible need. There is love. Not the sappy love seen in movies but the strong, enduring love that allows itself to suffer beyond imagining in order to save another.
Jesus knew pain. He was fully human. I see my baby crying, trying to tell me he's hungry or hurting and I know Jesus cried and Mary had to figure out what he needed (though I'm pretty sure Mary would have only had to tell him once not to hit the ornaments). Jesus in the first Christmas knew pain. Why would we think that each subsequent Christmas should be painless?
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