Sneaky Expectations
How do you please everyone during the holidays?
Of course you can’t, but the pressure remains. I want everyone to feel loved and overflow with joy. Decorations are hung with care and I plan meals to delight. I shop for presents that will thrill and amuse the recipient. I try, boy do I try, but it somehow falls short.
As a child, Christmas always seemed magical. Funny, I don’t remember the toys as much as I remember how unique the day felt. This is what I want to feel again; this is what I want my loved ones to feel too.
Now that we are empty nesters, the time with our children is limited. For the past couple of years, we have been together between Christmas and New Year’s. It is a delight to have every bedroom full again and enjoy each other.
However, our “normal” Christmas was overshadowed in 2021 and again in 2023 by the death of loved ones. Grief, expressed differently by each of us, hung as an unwelcome guest. We stumbled through those holiday seasons uncertain how to navigate them.
The following year, I packed our time together with merriment to try to get back to our regular holiday. We played games, attended special events, exchanged presents, and ate way too much food.
It didn’t work.
No matter how much activity we packed in, the residue of grief hung in the air. Subconsciously, I wanted to mask discomfort and tension from the years before. Was it too much to ask for childlike joy to overwhelm us? That sneaky expectation was too much to navigate. The tension between sorrow and joy was real. We needed time to be together without all the hoopla.
I have learned to shift my focus from what we do to who’s around the table. I’m finding ways to treasure the individuals and not worry about entertaining them. My family needed hospitality centered on Jesus’ joy and peace, not holiday diversions.
“Our culture skews hospitality into visions of perfection. We are influenced by images of immaculate homes posted on the internet. Subtly, we are encouraged to buy the newest in-season items in the year’s colors. But hospitality isn’t just physical preparation but spiritual anticipation for those who need us. It is more than opening our homes; it is giving space for others to be seen and heard.
Our goal is not to impress our guests but to meet the needs of weary friends. It may be to prepare a meal and a space for them to talk. It can vary from an hour of our time to welcoming them into our family.” Excerpt from When God Transforms Your Broken Story, p. 160
This holiday season, take a breath and ask, why am I doing this? Who am I doing this for? What is stealing my joy and peace? Pray with me as Paul prayed, recorded in Romans 15:13 (NLT): “I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.”
