It's that time again the season of festivity our parishioners look forward to with great expectation. However, for some of us experienced in years of pastoral ministry, the days ahead come filled with a keen sense of dread, duty, and despair because of everything that we know must be accomplished. From years of experience, we quickly trans late Christmas and the surrounding holidays into the reality of pageants, programs, promotionals, pop-in guests, and pressure.
These next few weeks will bring out the best behavior in many of our members, but it also has a tendency to unleash the worst in pent-up frustrations. This season of celebration and blessings has mixed with it all the human ingredients that can rapidly deteriorate into days filled with stress and strain. So, what to do?
We've all memorized the famous verse "It is more blessed to give than receive" and as clergy families we are fortunate because we regularly experience the joy that comes in service to others. It carries its own special brand of satisfaction. But too often we have not allowed ourselves to experience the whole verse frequently it is very difficult and uncomfortable for us as pastoral families to "receive." To let someone minister to us. To let someone bestow upon us random acts of kindness and generosity. We are so tuned in to being the "caregivers" that we forget that it might be not just acceptable, but, necessary, for us to be "recipients."
My friend, Cathy, gently reminded me of this a few weeks ago when I was determined to repay her for a generous favor, "Why don't you just let somebody do something nice for you?" she frustratingly asked. It was my wake-up call.
The culture and society in which we live has managed to put a price tag on everything and the Christmas season only floodlights the problem into almost unbearable proportions for pastoral families.
We find ourselves applying retail dollars to things that should never carry a price tag. We let business language provide the metaphors for human interaction. We bemoan being in debt and in the same breath we talk about owing favors. Owing favors? Now really, if it is a true gift from a Christ-like heart, there is nothing owed. Nothing to repay.
Almost every ministry family has experienced that helpless feeling of being on the receiving end of a pseudogift you know the kind given with the express intention of getting us hooked. Then we become cynical. It is a bad habit and I've found myself regularly falling into it converting kindnesses into equivalents I feel compelled to reconcile as if I were exchanging currency at a bank for an extended itinerary.
We keep track of kind acts. We are afraid we are running up a bill. Whether it is accepting a ride to the market, receiving a plate of home-baked cookies, allowing the neighbor to shovel our driveway, or the traditional "exchange of cards" we have become much too aware of the costs and benefits of personal interactions and the tedious bookkeeping of trying to keep them "even." Sadly, we shun some genuine human relationships and gifts of kindness because we are afraid they come with strings attached. Blessings are thrown away as disposable.
And so, here it is Christmas again. We are all going to be involved in a lot of "giving." Our time. Our talent. Our treasure. And there is a good possibility we will experience the seeds of self-pity and bitterness when the season is over if we haven't taken a moment to let someone bestow upon us some extravagant gesture of good-will.
Have you seen the face of a grateful person not someone grateful for what you have done for them, but a person filled with the love of Jesus who is gratified just to be able to do something nice for you is there a price tag on that?
If we allow into our Christian ministry the for-profit values that the business world runs on, there is a good possibility we will forget all the wonderful values that should never be translated into financial terms.
Jesus gave us the ultimate gift 2,000 years ago. It is the very reason we celebrate today. Tragically, some cynical and dysfunctional people are still frantically trying to repay that gift by keeping score of their good works and calculat ing their way into His kingdom trying to get even with Jesus for His unselfish gift of salvation.
It may seem uncomfortable. It may seem foreign to our service-oriented view of ministry. But just try it once. Experiment with simply savoring that extraordinary moment of being on the receiving end of a human blessing with out a thought of reciprocation. You might just realize that not only are you receiving a blessing but you are giving someone else a chance to experience the magnanimous joy of giving. Now that's a Merry Christmas!
