Balancing Struggle with Gratitude
It almost sounds like a cliché at this point. The obligatory reminder that this holiday season may actually be the hardest time of the year for someone else. Of course it’s true but aren’t most platitudes?
I’ve been there. That awkward place when your emotional or spiritual health doesn’t line up correctly with the calendar. To put it simply: it sucks. But trying to hide it to keep others from having pity on you also sucks.
It’s a catch twenty-two. A hard line to strike. But a line that I recently observed a local pastor walk gracefully and graciously to my surprise.
A couple of weeks ago I found myself in the auditorium of a church I had never intended on attending. Not that I had anything against them, I just worked for a church for a long time that would have been in competition with them whether we acknowledged it or not. Church work can be strange sometimes.
Either way, as the pastor made his way through his introductory statements I began to worry that I had chosen the wrong place at the wrong time. He started to discuss the upcoming holiday, Thanksgiving, and the fact that some people’s “burdens were more evident than their blessings at the moment.” I feared the worst.
But then he took the topic to a place I had not expected it to go. Specifically, to John chapter 6. And as he read through the very familiar passage of Jesus feeding the five thousand, I began to think a little differently about how we might see our problems in this holiday season.
For reference, it goes like this:
So when Jesus looked up and noticed a huge crowd coming toward him, he asked Philip, “Where will we buy bread so that these people can eat?” He asked this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii worth of bread wouldn’t be enough for each of them to have a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There’s a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish—but what are they for so many?” Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass in that place; so they sat down. The men numbered about five thousand. Then Jesus took the loaves, and after giving thanks he distributed them to those who were seated—so also with the fish, as much as they wanted.
John 6:5-11(CSB)
If I am honest, it has been lost on me my entire life that Jesus chose to be thankful in the deficiency before the miracle ever took place.
He did not deny that there wasn’t enough food, but he also did not did not deny God the possibility to provide in that moment. A point that was critical to this Sunday’s teaching. Man, was I grateful I showed up on the day that I did.
So often my life can be left up to patterns that I just position myself to try and ride out. Then I wake up, it’s the end of the year, I’m surrounded by family and I am still trying to solve problems from the spring or summer.
And I wonder: am I just worse at life than all these other people?
But the example Jesus sets for us in this moment is that it’s possible to acknowledge that things aren’t optimal and that God is still good. And sometimes being able to express gratitude for something small may be enough to break the cycle we have found ourselves in.
Maybe it’s worth trying this holiday season. Go ahead and be vulnerable if you aren’t doing well right now, but also take some time to find a place for gratitude. Balance the vulnerability with the very real possibility that God is working in the background.
We may just find that our list of worries can be a list of ways we have been cared for this next year.
