A Christmas for Every Season

Christmas is an amplifier. It turns the volume up on everything.

Gingerbread houses, eggnog, and presents under the tree take a child’s normal excitement and turn it into a five-alarm fire. Last-minute prep for guests, or packing up to travel, cranks up the stress. Suitcases stack up. Guest rooms get flipped. Schedules tighten. Then there is the expected joy. Family you rarely see. A shared table. Whatever it is your people put at the center of it all.

But amplification cuts both ways.

The man separated from his children feels the ache more sharply. The chair where Grandma or Grandpa once sat is empty, and the silence is louder because they are now with the Lord. Old tensions between siblings, parents, children, aunts, and uncles do not fade. They get highlighted.

Joy is amplified.
Sorrow is amplified.
Conflict is amplified.

Christmas does not create these things. It reveals them.

Every season has to be handled according to its conditions. Christmas in the frozen north calls for coats and a roaring fire. Christmas in the deep south might mean a T-shirt with reindeer on it and a fan running full blast. You dress for the weather because the weather demands it.

In the same way, you have to prepare your heart for this season according to where God has placed you.

So where are you? What is God asking you to carry, enjoy, endure, or finally face this Christmas?

Scripture speaks straight into moments like this. “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all” (Romans 12:18). If you are at odds with someone you will see over the holidays, take this as a providential opening. Move things, even slightly, toward peace. Give a hug. Shake a hand. Be kind. Give a gift. Offer something small but real that says, I do not want this to stay broken forever.

You will not fix everything in one afternoon. But Christmas comes with a strange social pressure to be polite. Why not redeem that pressure and use it for good? Some divisions are severe, and wisdom may require distance. A hug might not be appropriate. But get as close as you can without lying or pretending. Christ came to make peace, not quiet, not avoidance, but real peace. “For he himself is our peace… that he might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility” (Ephesians 2:14–16). The angels did not whisper it. They announced it. “On earth peace among those with whom he is pleased” (Luke 2:14).

Scripture also reminds us that “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). Maybe you find yourself alone, or lonelier than you expected. Maybe work pulled you far from family. Maybe it is something darker. There are no gifts under the tree. Maybe there is no tree. Maybe no one around it.

But you still have one of the greatest gifts a human being can have. Time.

Time is a luxury. It is limited. And God has given you one more Christmas. One more to make amends. One more to write the letter you keep avoiding. One more to serve instead of stewing. Nothing pulls us out of self-centered despair, even despair rooted in real sorrow, like turning outward and serving others. Use the gift well.

Maybe this is a rare Christmas, the peaceful kind. The joyful kind. The one your kids will talk about years from now. If so, the instruction is simple. Celebrate. Sing hymns. Play carols that name Christ without apology. Watch the smiling faces. Savor laughter. Give thanks.

And for most of us, it is mixed. In our own home, Emily had to do most of the wrapping herself. There will be no gifts from Grandma Dawn under the tree. There is joy and sadness. Busyness and a quiet loneliness that slips in at odd moments. But it all comes from God’s hand. And if you receive the Christmas He has given you in faith, it will be a good Christmas.

So use these days well. Spend your time wisely. Enjoy the good gifts God has given you.

Merry Christmas.