Christian Living

This Christmas, When Suffering Overwhelms Joy

by Rajkumar Richard
12/25/20
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            So we reckon our Christmas celebration is complete when we have decorated our homes, attended the church service, placed our offering, eaten good food, gifted ourselves and our friends and family good gifts, and invited carolers and/or our friends to our home to reminisce the birth of our good Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

            A joyful Christmas season is one marked by each of these activities being performed in the best manner possible.

            Some Christians would add a noble gesture during the Christmas season. They would visit and bless those in the orphanages, hospitals, old age homes, and institutions for special people. Indeed a noble and a gracious gesture admirably appropriate for the Christmas season.

            Joy, happiness, contentment, fun, frolic, merry making, and to an extent blessing those in need symbolizes our Christmas season. 

            Hundreds of years before Christ, the Bible prophesying about HIS birth mentions a gory detail about Christ’s imminent life, “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer…” (Isaiah 53:10, NIV).

            Christ did not come to enjoy a luxurious life, HE came into this world to suffer and die. Gory suffering was the means to the salvation of mankind.

            Suffering is thus intrinsic to the Christmas season.

            As it is, the presence of evil in our world makes many lives wallow in pain and misery. If we are to add the consequences of Covid to this situation, many more households are likely to be in pain and misery.

            So during this Christmas season let us be alert to people around us.

            Some of them may be mourning or silently suffering. They may not even have a shoulder to cry on or someone to empathize with their sorrow. They may also be in financial crisis.

            These brothers and sisters are longing for deliverance or at least some encouragement and comfort from their pain and misery.

            Their homes are not decorated this Christmas. No one is there to give them gifts. There is no special meal for them on Christmas day.

            Christmas day is another routine day - another day managing their suffering by bearing pain; another day longing for someone to care for them.

            They do think of and count their blessings. They do have an undying faith in God.

            But their pain overwhelms their joys.

            Why should their Christmas be a day of suffering when there are so many Christians who can afford to make their lives at least a little bit better than the other days?

            Do not count on the local church to encourage and comfort these souls in pain. The church of Jesus Christ is hardwired to cater to a larger group. The church cares less about that one single family in pain or that one single brother or sister neck-deep in suffering.

            It is incumbent upon every Christian who has been blessed abundantly by the Triune God to bless those in [intense] pain and suffering.

            This Christmas, you and I can…

            “Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed…”” (Luke 14:12-14a, NIV).

            May this Christmas be merry even in those households burdened with sorrow.