I wonder if you've ever had a Christmas where things were not as they should have been,

or maybe that describes this current holiday season for you.

Perhaps you are exhausted and overwhelmed by your over full schedule, or financially stretched,

buried in bad news, stressed and sleepless because of relationship challenges,

or you can't go to another festive dinner and pretend that everything's okay when you know deep down inside that it's not.

In other words, the holidays are a mess. I mean, if we're honest, maybe you feel like you're a mess.

Friend, I get it. But skipping over the month of December isn't an option. And even if it were,

we'd only carry our old stresses and messes into a new season.

How do we make it through the most wonderful time of the year when we've lost our jolliness

and we don't want to jingle all the way? Let's cling to the truth. God's truth reminds us that

no matter the size of our holiday mess, we are not alone. From the beginning, Christmas has always

been messy. If scratch and sniffed Bibles were

really a thing, we would smell the stench when we read about the first Christmas in Luke

chapter 2. Unlike the beautiful scenes from children's story Bibles, Jesus' birthplace was dirty,

stinky, stanky, and a manger. Basically, Jesus was born in a mess. Think about it. Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, which literally means God's with us, chose to be born in a mess.

And now Jesus promises us to be with us always, even in our mess.

One of the verses I cling to during painful seasons or messy Christmases is Hebrews 1123,

which says, let us hold unswervingly to the faith we

profess for he who promised is faithful. The message Bible paraphrase it this way. Let's keep a firm

grip on the promises that keep us going. God always keeps his word. I want to keep a firm grip on

God's promises that I am not alone, and neither are you.

Friend, whatever you do, don't sit in your loneliness.

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