So many Christmas seasons I filled with hopes and dreams for feelings.
I had seasonal bucket lists of all the “Christmassy” things. Hot cocoa. Caroling. Cutting down our own tree. Light-drives. New pajamas. Christmas cookies. Christmas books. Homemade or carefully -selected presents for all the people we know. Angel-tree gifts.
On the years where we weren’t able to do all the things, I felt myself struggling to be content. I see those same sentiments reflected on Facebook lately. People sharing how they’re having a hard time getting in the holiday spirit. And I know that feeling exactly. It especially can be present when we are missing a loved one, or a tradition has been forced to be changed.
This season has been so different for me.
I don’t know if I’d say I’ve necessarily been in a “holiday spirit”, because I feel the same that I feel most of the time now…
I feel the hope and joy and peace that all the Christian carols sing about.
I feel a stillness in my soul, that could take or leave all the regular traditions and be just as content.
I find myself surprised at how full I feel, despite this being the first year we didn’t cut our own tree down.
Or the fact that our gift budget is much smaller.
Or the reality that I just have had too many other things to do and haven’t gotten the outside lights up.
It’s like a “sorry, not sorry feeling”… like maybe I should feel sad and apologetic that I’ve interrupted the way we’ve always done it, but NOT at all sorry, because that old holiday spirit feeling I used to chase…well it was just a glimpse of HIM, and now He is with me ALWAYS! Holy Spirit chased me down and He is with me all year long.
Holy Spirit beats the world’s versions of holiday spirit, all day every day! ❤️
Trying to be content-
Trying to muster up the holiday spirit feelings…
Sometimes that can be one of the most difficult feelings there is.
Almost a grief of sorts.
When we cannot control things and traditions, we grieve our inability to make ourselves feel the way those things made us feel.
But if we have Jesus we don’t have to grieve as the world does.
And giving is good, but giving with the main intention of making us feel better, well He can still use that, and others will still be blessed … but the motivation for that is off.
Holy Spirit has shown me so many times this year that when we chase the feels, we may catch glimpses of them but often they’ll flit a way like a butterfly, disappear as quickly as a desert-mirage.
But when we sit still in the quiet place with Him, we find that HE- the God of the universe- has been chasing US all along! Holy Spirit’s fullness can override all the other icky feelings that we struggle with, including discontent.
We don’t have to get ourself out of anything.
Not grief. Not a sense of lack. Not disappointment. Not doubt. Not unforgiveness. Not a lack of motivation.
We don’t have to muster up the good feels.
All we have to do is invite him into them with us!
He can and will override the “icky” supernaturally if we ask Him.
He will comfort us,
help us feel complete,
help us hope,
help us believe,
erase the emotions off painful memories
so that we can forgive,
and help give us momentum which is better than motivation!
He does all of this
by filling us up with the very best PRESENCE- which is better than any present-
His!
From Full 