“It’s the most wonderful time of the year!” That old-fashioned Andy Williams song jingles in streets over the world as a segway into the Christmas season. For many of us living in snowless shores, Christmas celebrations are more fantasy than reality. We are so enthralled by the romanticized picture of commercial giants so much so that we put up fake christmas trees in our home with fake cotton-snow, pretend that we are in the West and dress up bellyless Santas in paper masks. Even for someone like me who doesn’t believe in celebrating Christmas, the distorted revelry does get under the skin. It is true for many of us, no matter which culture we come from.
The world is a noisy place, and this season just got more jarring.
When I turn on Instagram, every picture feels suddenly tinted in green and red, and everyone is just about in a happy mood, baking the best dishes and making the best gifts. We get the best emails from friends at the end of the year, the best discounts for avid shoppers, and perhaps even the best gifts. It seems like the world got better with all the shiny, happy people. But the reality is far from this idyllic Instashot.
Coming home has become overwhelming. Keeping up with family traditions and prepping up for family dinners can be really stressful for some. Coming home to a dysfunctional family with an absentee father or a controlling mother can be stressful for some others. Several suffer acute loneliness during this season, even as they scroll through endless photos of those who seem to be happier. Some turn the pages of the past with great grief in the loss of a loved one. Others scour the future with much fear and worry. Still others are stuck in the present, unable to move past a sinful habit or a ritual pattern that is so hard to get out of. Culturally we live in tumultuous times. Christians are terrorized by the threat of anti-conversion bills and right-winged bullies, constantly living their own rightful lives as though they have committed the unpardonable sin. Young blokes are calling for a ‘ghar wapasi’ (homecoming to the home religion) to seal the nation’s ethnic identity, unaware that such tactics make the idea of home more abhorrent. We have no where to escape and no place to rest our weary heads.
It is to such as these that Christ has come. In various parts of Scripture we hear this tender beckoning of Christ to sinners and strugglers alike. He bids us come, right where we are, not where we think He wants us to be.
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”, says Jesus (Matt 11:28).
He doesn’t call for the lively and the energetic but the weary and heavy laden. Shopping malls and even churches pump up the amp to enliven the experience of Christmas “shoppers”, but Jesus does nothing of that sort. He knows that nothing from the outside can shake up a weary soul and decides to offer him the one thing he desperately needs: rest.
“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet,they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”, he says (Is 1:18). J
Jesus calls us to explain things to Him, to reason with Him, to dialogue. When he sees us robed in our scarlet sins, he is not grossed out enough to turn away from us. That happened only once, and once and for all at the cross. Behind the sin stained veil, he sees a wounded, hurting and guilt-ridden lamb looking for Someone to wash her clean. None else can do this but your spotless Christ. He doesn’t want you pretty looking and decked up for Christmas. He doesn’t want your best gifts, your best clothes and your best smiles. He wants you to come naked before Him and give Him your blemished heart.
“Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.”, he says (Is 55:1-2).
Jesus calls tenderly to those thirsting and hungry but who know not the way to replenish themselves. He is giving Himself, the spring of eternal life to quench our thirsts. “Come”, he says, “to eat of me for I am the Bread of Life” (Jn 6:35). When we drink from the broken cisterns of this world, and numb our pain with meth fixes, pornhub, and drunkenness of various sorts, we are deaf to this free offer of God. “Child, why do you spend money for what is not bread?” Christmas will come and go, partying will last only a night, but Jesus is here to stay in your pain. When the fix wears off, and the pain doubles up, Jesus yet offers lasting relief and satisfaction in Him.
O prodigal child, you only need to lift your head in your utter ruin to remember that your father feeds the least of his servants better than what you’re feeding off. Run away from your corrosive life right into His waiting arms, and tuck your weary head into His loving bosom. (Lk 15:17-18). For this Father of yours does not merely wait as in the story, hands-off, for you to turn. No. He actively pursued you by sending His Son to a faraway place, away from His resting place, away from His Bosom and into a hostile and rotten place to bring back home sinners like you to Himself (2 Cor 5:19). As Dane Ortland puts it, “The posture most natural to him is not a pointed finger but open arms.” This Jesus is God in flesh, God who came to be with us, Immanuel. He doesn’t leave you alone, orphaned in this strange place (Jn 14:18 ). He is now preparing a place for you so that you can be with Him where He is. Home. (Jn 14-2-3). You only need to turn towards Him and come.
Come in the quietness of your room. Come in the heaviness of your heart. Come in the brokenness of your spirit. Come with eyes wearied from crying, pillows softened with tears. “But”, you retort, “I am still angry, hurting, and unclean. He deserves more, better”. He has never wanted more or better, only a broken and hurt sinner, so come. Here these reassuring words of Jesus: “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” (Jn 6:37). By no means will He reject. Never. Nada.
So just come.
He bids us come, right where we are, not where we think He wants us to be.