“You’re in a season where joy and happiness should be a daily staple, but you’re totally numb and exhausted. You question if you’ll ever be able to feel that joy and happiness again.”
–Author unknown

Buckle up, folks; it’s here. The Christmas season’s now in full bloom. The halls are decked, the tree is decorated, and the outdoor lights are shiny and bright. Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Giving Tuesday have come and gone, but shoppers soldier on, determined to check off items on their “Gifts to Buy” lists.

It’s Christmas, with its parties, gifts, food, church services, concerts, and family get-togethers. Everyone’s in the Christmas spirit.

Well, no; not everyone. For some, this is their first Christmas with a parent or older sibling no longer present. For others, for the first time in a long time, it’s a Christmas without a spouse or perhaps a close friend. There’s an empty seat at the table, and that means things aren’t the same.

Listen, life without hardship, tragedy, and grief is just a fairy tale. In the real world, all of us have experienced, or will experience, such emotions. They just seem more poignant and heart-wrenching this time of the year.

Maybe you’ve been there. Spirits are bright, folks are unusually cordial, and joy fills the air . . . and all you can think is, “How can everyone just go about the business of Christmas when my life’s been shattered?”

Believers were never promised a “rose garden.” Jesus warned his closest disciples of the hardships they’d face in life. Even Paul, the erudite author of over half of the New Testament, wrote, “For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known (1 Corinthians 13:12 NIV).”

I can only imagine how long the line will be for people in queue to hear God explain to them why bad things happen to good people!

For things do happen that we can’t explain or reconcile. Our faith is tested. Somehow, we get through it, for we know, as David assures us, “. . . weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning (Psalm 30:5 NIV).” We lean on our faith–something we know in our heart to be true that we can’t explain with our brain, as a pastor friend of mine likes to say.

So, if you have been there, maybe, just maybe, you can use your experience for good by reaching out to someone going through a difficult and lonely time in their life. Use what you survived, and learned from, to be a blessing to someone else. Your call, note, or visit might just be the thing that makes their Christmas bearable.

And, for all of us, go out at night and look up at that star in the east. It not only guides us to the Christ Child, as it did the wise men that first Christmas, but it glows with the assurance that in Him we have faith, we have hope, and we know there will be rejoicing in the morning.