In the Christian community, I think we subconsciously live this life without knowing it. We know who our Redeemer, Savior, Prince of peace is, yet He isn't the One we go to first. It's in our human nature to take control. We might as well say, "When all else fails, give it to God" when we should be saying, "Because all else fails, I give it to God" because He never will fail us.
I'm learning this the hard way, like I always do.
If I'm being honest, the past month has sucked. It has brutally sucked. Things have gotten really hard. The holidays are always hard for my family and I especially since losing my mom. Nothing ever seems easy during the holidays. My mom would make all the food on Thanksgiving, recruit people to clean up the house, set the table, yell at us to get our grimy, taste-testing fingers out of the mashed potatoes, and still manage impress us with her superpowers and make everyone laugh in the act.
Christmas was always incredible. After Thanksgiving, her and I would set up the tree together and she would yell at me to turn off my "Shrek the Halls" CD. My mom did all the shopping and also somehow made me believe in Santa Claus until I was 14 (that's right, people.. I believed in Santa until my 8th grade year, but I was stubborn and had to find out for myself!). Christmas Day, my dad would make breakfast and then we'd open gifts at like 1:00pm because my brothers never woke up early. Every person got a gift. No one was forgotten. Everyone felt loved because we had one hell of a mom that put so much effort into making us feel special. We would hang out for the rest of the day and just spend it together, lazily.
December 31st is my birthday. My mom was always one to give a gift to her kids instead of just money. No matter how old we were, there was always a cake. She was the best at making cakes. She would find new designs or decorations in baking magazines and try them out for us and, at least for me, make me take a picture with it while sitting on the same old, rickety kitchen table for years. In no way here am I saying that my siblings and I were spoiled (even though all my other siblings say I was because I was the youngest), but we were shown our worth and how much we were loved and cared for because our mom gave her best for us to know that.
Since Mom passed away, nothing has really felt like that. And I know, nothing ever will feel the same after losing a family member, that's for sure. But Thanksgiving is never at my dad's house anymore; for the past 3 years it has been at my sisters'. Christmas is hell for me. My dad doesn't like to shop so he just ends up giving us money. There's no magical feel to Christmas morning. We don't do breakfast anymore. Last year and this year we had dinner at my sister's and just hung out. My brother Timmy and his husband Brady came in town from South Carolina and made amazing food. I am so thankful that I still get to spend time with my family and for a sister that so ungrudgingly gives up her home for us to be together. My Christmas looks different. We're adapting and changing and it hurts. Nothing feels right without my mom here. Christmas isn't only hard for those reasons, but also my family members have different ways of healing and coping my mom's passing that aren't always the healthiest, leaving my family broken in some ways and leaving my heart bitter.
This year and last year my friend Emily and I threw a New Years Eve/Birthday party. Last year was my 21st birthday and everything went wonderfully. I felt loved and known by my friends. It was real special. This year the party didn't go as smoothly as I had planned due to the speakers for the dance party not working for 2.5 hours of a 4 hour party. I was really bummed out. I cried of frustration in my friend's room because I was lost and I wanted everyone to have fun.
Reflecting on this party this year, I felt mad and frustrated because I put so much into it, but deep down I wanted this party to make up for the crappy past month I have had. I put my all into trying to please others with this NYE/Bithday party as a means of feeling better about my family letting me down, Christmas & Thanksgiving never feeling special, and also freaking out about what I am planning to do after I graduate. This fun party (including a ball drop, a dance party, sparklers, might I add :) -- haha!), was going to make me feel better about everything that had gone wrong and made me upset.
I filled my blank with "have the best NYE/birthday party ever". And needless to say, it let me down.
I'm not saying the whole party was a bust. I'm not saying I didn't have fun at all. But what I am saying is this party that I put so much time, effort, and money into, that I thought would temporarily mask all the pain I was feeling, that I thought would make me feel better, ended up letting me down. It didn't satisfy me or make me feel whole by any means. If anything, I felt more upset thinking that people didn't have fun because music wasn't playing for 2.5 hours. How silly is it that I need to remind myself that 2.5 hours of no music is not the end of the world. Even if nothing had gone wrong with this party, I still wouldn't have felt full. I still would have a broken family that would upset me again. I would still be worried about what all my friends thought about the party, and I still would have been freaking out about something else. Nothing is ever going to be perfect.
We have messy lives. We don't have families out of ABC family movies. We don't have Christmases like we would dream. We don't always have Thanksgiving like we see on the front of cooking magazines. We live in a world of hurt and pain and loss and disappointment and let downs. We know that. We're human; we've experienced that.
So what? What can we do about it? We can't change anything?
It might be true that we can't change what happens, but we can change where/what we put our hope in. We can change how we react to things. We can remember what really matters. We can change how we fill our blanks.
Instead of "If all else fails, I'll throw a NYE/Birthday party to make me feel better", I should have said, "Because all else fails, I will give it to God because He doesn't fail."
Don't go to God when everything fails. Go to Him in all things. He doesn't fail. He satisfies. He is the true meaning behind Thanksgiving (he gave me all the things I am thankful for), Christmas (Jesus being born to save the world is what it's all about), and my birthday (He breathed me into existence. He has graciously given me 22 years of healthy life). He is the reason behind it ALL. Don't let Him be the effect to a stupid cause in your cause and effect equation. Make Him the cause. Everything will let you down, but the Lord won't. Make Him the foundation of all you do and all you are because then, in the midst of chaos and imperfection, you are able to have peace.
The holidays will always be hard and different than the norm for me. This past month, I feel like I have taken one blow after another. But I am learning the hard way that putting all your hope into worthless things won't bring you joy -- only Christ's love will. I am so thankful that holidays are about so much more than everything being perfect. If it were that way, I would NEVER meet those expectations. But our God is a living God and knows what we're dealing with. I am so thankful that HE is the firm foundation of it all. That HE is the center. That it is all about HIM. Don't run after parties or things to fill you up and to make you feel better -- run to HIM.
Not only is is all about Him, but also when we run to worthless things rather than Him, He shows us grace upon grace upon grace. He forgives us. I'm so glad that I'm not good enough.
So this year, in 2016, I am choosing not to fill my blank with Earthly, worthless things. I am choosing not to say, "When all else fails, _______". I am choosing, instead, to say, "Because all else fails, I will give it to God."
... and remember, WE'RE TOO BLESSED TO BE STRESSED
