How are you doing right now?
That’s right. YOU. How are YOU doing right now?
If you’re reading this, there is a fair chance you’re not doing as well as you’d like, and are not feeling as well as you’d hope. And that’s okay. What you like, and what you hope, still matters to me because it matters to God. And if temporarily misplaced right now, I assure you it is waiting to be found.
What you like and hope is still real. And when you aren’t “feeling it,” I can also assure you it is still there waiting for you. It hasn’t been taken away; it just hasn’t been wrapped this year or placed beneath a tree. It is instead somewhere around just waiting to be discovered. It is something you will like. It is something you have hoped for.
What is it?
Where is it?
Sometimes out of habit, we still look for Christmas under a tree. Or inside wrapping paper. Or around a table. Or in a chair. Or on a plate. And in a different place. Maybe a different house? In a mall or in a church sanctuary or in a different state or city?
So maybe this is the year to underscore how Christmas is not a noun. Not a person, place, or thing. Not an adjective. Not even a merry, joyous, or jolly person, place, or thing.
No.
Christmas is a verb.
Always was and always will be. It’s an action verb. Christmas is what God gave the world God so loved, the biggest surprise ever provided……left unwrapped and placed somewhere else to be discovered, not where or what we were even expecting. And Christmas is, likewise, what we do for others we care about. Because it’s what we do for others that gives us our feelings of joy to the world. It’s what we do to surprise others that gives us our jollies inside.
You see, it’s always easier to act our way into a new way of feeling than it is to feel our way into a new way of acting.
God knows there’s always been a healing balm for anyone who’s not yet “feeling it.” God knows Christmas is a verb. Doing the unexpected for someone not expecting it is what gives us our feelings of merriment.
So I’ll ask it one more time. How are YOU doing right now? Because after you’re through doing it, the promise of Christmas is that you will like the hope it brings you. And what you like and hope still matters to God, and to the world God still so loves.