Christmas is Depressing?

This reflection was written way back in 2000 but I somehow couldn't find them on my blogs, so.. here it is dug up from my hard disk.

Christmas is depressing. So the experts tell us.

Psychologists have long been familiar with a phenomena they call 'Holiday Blues' (HB). Characterised by a sad, melancholy and anxious mood connected with the holiday season, such a state is seen as pathological and inappropriate because of its mood-incongruent features1 . Some reports claim attempted suicide increased during and after Christmas.
The heart of HB is captured by this statement: People are supposed to be happy and glad during the holidays - since I am not, there is something wrong with me that must be fixed or made to disappear.

The etiology of Holiday Blues is multi-factorial. If you're feeling down when the guy next to you is straining 'Fa la la la la!' in high-pitched tones, the contrast is depressing. Also, the year end is a time of self-evaluation and remembering past failures - 'I didn't do so good this year, what's there to celebrate?'. If we're separated from family and loved ones, the loneliness and isolation becomes intensified. And there is pressure to appear sociable and happy at parties, gatherings, and even church services. Wrap that all up with fatigue and stress and you have a sure formula for a crash, burnout and depression.

That's the scene today - artificial merriment making things worse for a person who has real problems of life to cope with.

Ah.. but that's the world! You say. Surely Christians are not susceptible to this phenomena! We have the true meaning of Christmas! Well, to investigate how Christians feel, I asked some old friends about their experience in past Christmases. Take note of the irony in what they say.

"There is so much work, so little time to reflect!"
"I remember how (as a student) I used to feel so empty on Christmas day because that's the time everything is over."
"All the activities! And nobody focuses on the beauty of Christmas itself."

It's a tragedy, I say. Caroling hungrily from street to street. Endless rehearsals to get that note or step just right for the choir and dance. Massive mind-boggling preparations for the Christmas mega concert. All resulting in us having no time and no energy, to focus on the wrong thing anyway. In our efforts to tell the joyous message, we are spending ourselves so completely that we have nothing left with which to savor the hope and reason for Christmas ourselves.

Brothers, let's make this Christmas different. As a recurrent victim of Holiday Blues over many years of Christmas cantatas and campaigns, I plead with you. We need to. And we can. If you are racing towards the end of the year, laden with the burdens of the world, only to cry 'It is finished!' and collapse in a heap, remember this : Jesus already did that for you 2000 years ago. You don't have to repeat his act!


Receive Hope

Face it - it's been a year of win some, lose some. A fair share of accomplishments and failures. Maybe more failures than accomplishments. So what? God knows that, and loves you no less. Taking stock of the year can be discouraging. Hey, it's okay to be sad for a while - even in Christmas. But let your reflection lead you to thanksgiving, repentance and a renewed trust in God for the next chapter. God's compassion in making that journey from Heaven to emerge between the splayed legs of a teenage Mary in a smelly barn - should - a) bring me comfort (that He is with us and understands us) and b) renew my love for others (the same way God loves them).

Nourish yourself

Make time to be with good friends and loved ones. Lots of it. And preferably with good food. Be yourself and let others be themselves too. Revel in the relationships. Talk about life, laugh, and reaffirm that you are there for each other. Pick up the phone and reach the faraway. Ties to be renewed are more important than tasks to be finished. After all, the gift of loving relationships is what 'peace and goodwill to men' is all about.

Worship in rest

Above all, let our hearts be led into worship after copious doses of rest. You deserve it. Bolt the door. Snooze for as long as you like with the alarm clock off. And when you awake, in silence remember Jesus. It's just between you and Him. Offer your own version of frankincense, myrrh and gold in your own quiet way of worship. When we lift our eyes off of the world and ourselves, to set it high upon God above, we will surely find the reason beyond our little lives,.. for the season and beyond.

The Magic of Christmas

This message was delivered at Ampang Gospel Centre's Youth Christmas Night on 18 December 2004

A TRIP TO BETHLEHEM

In the latest offering by Tom Hanks, The Polar Express, a young boy’s sense of the magic of Christmas fades as he confronts the myth of Santa Claus. But in a series of neck-breaking adventures on a magical train he learns that by believing hope is restored. In Hanks’ deep and lustrous voice, the ticket collector tells him, ‘The most real things in this world can’t be seen or touched.’ Though he finally gets to see AND touch Santa it was only when he believed that the tinkling of sleigh bells could be heard again. The magic was at last restored.

Rediscovering the real magic of Christmas buried under layers of commercialism on one hand and church activity on the other is a real challenge. Christmas is a good time indeded to find hope again. To experience a miracle.

If Christmas is about restoring hope, what we do we need to believe? What have we lost the ability to hear? What do need to see and touch this Christmas? What is the REAL THING?

Follow me on a journey, not to the North Pole, but East to Bethlehem, 30BC or so to meet some shepherds and their encounter with the real thing.

Read Luke 2:8-20

Ken Gire in Moments with the Saviour, sets the stage:

‘This knot of shepherds on the fringe of Jewish society spends the night atop a stone tower, a couple of them watching the flocks while the others huddle around a fire, catching what sleep they can. Eusebius writes that this watchtower stood about a thousand paces from Bethlehem. Jewish tradition adds that the tower overlooked a special flock of sheep. Sheep set aside for sacrifices.’

The Shepherds

These were the among the few people who first beheld the baby Jesus. Who saw him and touched him as a newborn. And through history we can reach back in time to ‘see and touch’ Jesus too. The baby, whom John tells us is God in the flesh. Coming into the world between the legs of teenage girl barely able to comprehend what was going on. Not an abstract philosophy or a set of beliefs. Not a feel-good story for the year-end. He is real as flesh and blood is real.

But what made it more amazing was that these shepherds were considered an unclean people by religious law (read Lev 11:44 onwards.) They were a shunned minority encamped outside of Bethlehem. Forbidden from temple worship, anyone who touches them also becomes unclean immediately. It was no fun being a shepherd, cast out into unmarked fields and walled off from society. So how could shepherds who are unclean and unfit to come into contact with the Holy – to see and touch God in the flesh?

The Lamb

Ken Gire describes what it would’ve been like for the shepherds to meet Jesus: ‘there amid the straw, with white cloths wound so tightly around him, he looks to them like a newborn lamb… He lies there so meekly. Cradled in the most unexpected of places. Coming.. in the weakest of ways.’

These shepherds who guarded sheep set apart for sacrifices would’ve understood. For centuries, hundreds of thousands of lambs have been slaughtered to make up for the sins of the people. Animal after animal, there was no end to it. They could never truly pay for their sins. Not until this one perfect lamb. The one spotless, blameless and without blemish sent to take away the sins of the world. A perfect sacrifice by one who is without sin. This was a baby born to die. Destined to shoulder our sins and die in our place.

The baby Jesus was both the Holy One and the Lamb who will make the way for God and man to be reconciled. Beyond seeing and touching, that is what we need to believe today. Jesus came to us in flesh and blood. And it is the same flesh that will be pierced years later, on a cross. The same blood that is poured out on Calvary. He came to reach us who are unclean and by His blood make us clean.

When we look at the baby Jesus, we are looking at one, as Gire says, who is ‘Waiting for us to come, yet willing for us not to. Waiting for us to see, yet willing for us to turn away. Waiting for us to worship him, yet willing for us to renounce him… He is Christ the Lord. Yet he has placed himself at the mercy of his creation. At the mercy of strangers to take him in. At the mercy of animals to warm him. At the mercy of mortals to feed him, to protect him, to raise him…’

He invites us to come as we are – though unclean, unwanted and without hope. Stoop low into the manger to see and touch. Believe again that He has been born into our lives to save us. And listen to his unconditional love to you.

‘But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.’

Like Mary, let us fully receive and deeply rejoice in the miracle of the Holy God born into our lives. Like the shepherds let us worship in humble awe, deeply grateful for our new lives – not as the unclean and unwanted but as the Beloved and the Chosen. For that is the ‘magic of Christmas’ that we need to believe and experience for ourselves.