This is also a time of year that I see as a "battle of beliefs." Some people get highly offended if the word "holiday" is used in place of what they believe to be true. Yet other people get offended if you do offer them a specific greeting, especially if it's a greeting they don't personally believe in.
It's just a damned if you do, and damned if you don't time of year.
My personal pet peeve during this time of year is the pervasive belief that Christmas is a season. It's not. Christmas is one day, and one day only. There are lots of other days to be celebrated, other holidays during the season of Gratitude, Miracles, and Hope (which is what I believe this season to be). So I am not bothered that there are other holidays in the months of November and December that I do not personally celebrate.
Beliefs have great power to shape the course of reality.
My understanding of and relationship with God is changing, and it has been absolutely lovely to walk around feeling precious and special knowing that I was created for a unique and special purpose that I have yet to discover. And this new belief has also brought to the surface another outdated belief, the belief that I am inherently unloved and unwanted.
Believing one's self to be unloved and unwanted doesn't develop in a vacuum.
For my whole life I have grown up believing that I am inherently unlovable and unwanted. I've blogged previously about the context of being born to an unwed mother and a father who was married to another woman with two children who unknowingly became my half-brothers. It was also during an evolutionary period within a family system shaped by deeply held traditional Baptist beliefs, so the birth of an illigitimate daughter was anything but wanted and loved. And I invisibly held on to this belief as I journeyed through many other series of unfortunate events as they unfolded across time and space of my life.
But this is the season of Gratitude, Miracles, and Hope, and so it is possible for beliefs to change in an instant.
I never thought I would be able to move beyond the feeling unloved and unwanted, but I have. This new belief that God created me specifically and uniquely and with a specific and unique purpose really does change everything for me. And perhaps the story of my birth that focuses on the crises created in each of the two families I was born into is rooted in the belief that the illigitimate daughter born to an unwed mother and adulterous father is inherently unloved and unwanted. But there is more to this story than meets the eye.
Contrary to popular belief, I was not created by my parents. . .I was created by God.
So my birth isn't just about the human drama, because there's another story to be told. . .the story of how God created me specifically and uniquely with a purpose that I have yet to discover. And I'm honestly sorry that my newborn presence created so much pain and distress for everyone around me when I was born, but I didn't cause this distress, even if my illigitimate birth was the apparent and obvious cause.
God created this distressing event, not me. . . .so take it up with God.
Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Jesus, regardless of when his actual birthday might be. Which I look forward to celebrating with great joy and gratitude this year, because I find an unexpected appreciation of being born under circumstances that are less than normal. Although, in the case of Jesus I would have to rephrase that to greater than normal, as I'm not equating my own birth on the level of the birth of Jesus. But I do feel a sense of tangible connection with his birth in a way that I have not ever felt before.
And now I can see that Christmas isn't really about celebrating the birth of Jesus. Christmas is really about celebrating what many believe to be the purpose of the birth of Jesus, a purpose created uniquely and specifically for Jesus by God.
What a glorious day of celebration Christmas is going to be this year!
And wouldn't it be lovely if what was "normal" in this world was the belief that each and every person is created by God with a specific and unique purpose that make us all precious and special. . . .even if we don't always understand what that purpose is. . . .