O Come, All You Broken

Motivational Monday with Allana

“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them.” (Luke 1:67 NIV)

Last December was the loneliest Christmas of my life.

My newly married brother and his wife were spending the holidays with her family in Alberta. My youngest brother, then living an hour away from home and struggling with severe depression, had been invited for dinner, an offer he initially accepted with a half-hearted “Maybe.”

But when lunchtime rolled around with no word from my sibling, I called to check in on him.

“Hey . . . How are you?”

“Not great.” His voice was monotone.

We talked for a few minutes. I feebly re-extended the invitation for dinner, which he declined outright, claiming he wasn’t feeling well enough to make the trip.

After an unreciprocated “I love you,” I hung up the phone and placed it face-down on my desk.

With tears burning in my eyes, I slipped past the Christmas tree, ignoring the pile of presents still waiting to be unwrapped, and pulled my winter coat out of the front hall closet.

“What did he say?” asked my mother, coming into the entryway to check on me. I think the pain in my eyes told her everything she needed to know.

“I’m going for a walk.”

With this announcement, I slipped my boots onto my feet, shoved my hands into my pockets, and disappeared out the door.

* * *

As I wandered the country roads near our home that Christmas afternoon, I didn’t feel anywhere near merry and bright. The whole world seemed as cold and barren as my broken heart. A threadbare blanket of snow stretched its thin covering over the frost-nipped fields. Dull brown grass poked through the cracks in the broken asphalt as I crunched along down the road.

The tears that spilled from my eyes that cold afternoon were far from joyful and triumphant; but even in my grief, I couldn’t help lifting a broken melody to heaven:

“O come, all ye faithful . . .

O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem

Come and behold him, born the king of angels . . .”

It was the praise offering of a broken heart, a carol for the pine trees, the wheat fields, and perhaps a few curious angels bending near the earth.

It was my first Blue Christmas, and it forever changed the way I viewed Advent.

Photo by Aperture Vintage on Unsplash

Reading Advent Through a New Lens

The words “In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree . . .” always arouse sentimental feelings in my Christian heart. Soft, instrumental music plays in the background of my mind as I recall quiet Christmas mornings curled up with my family on the couch, the Bible spread open on our pajama-clad laps.

With so many cozy memories attached to the Christmas story, I never gave much consideration to how much crisis and upheaval surrounded Jesus’ birth—until I found my own life marked by longing, heartbreak, and estrangement.

When we tell the Christmas story to our children, we talk about the sweet virgin Mary and her faithful husband Joseph. We picture the animals sleeping quietly in the stable while the bright, heavenly choir sings to the shepherds on the hillside. In our songs and storybooks, we romanticize the Advent until it reads almost like a fairytale.

But while the Christmas story is indeed a divine romance, there are plenty of moments that didn’t feel like a Hallmark movie, like Mary’s “unplanned” pregnancy (Lk. 1:21-34), the marriage that almost ended in divorce (Matt. 1:19), and the labor pains that could not have started at a more inconvenient time (Lk. 2:6-7).

Our favorite carols convey the joy and triumph of Christ’s birth, but they often fail to capture other aspects of the story, like the physical pain Mary suffered as she birthed Jesus on the cold, hard ground with no midwife and no mother’s hand to hold, or the panic Joseph must have felt when his wife started going into labor and he could find no inn for them to spend the night.

Oscar Isaac & Keisha Castle-Hughes portray Joseph and Mary in The Nativity Story

Perhaps, if we allow ourselves to meditate on some of the less glamorous parts of the narrative, we may see reflections of our own broken stories.

O Come, Bitter and Broken

Last year, when my Christmas hopes shattered like a broken ornament, I found comfort in a song my pastor introduced to our worship team:

“O come, all you unfaithful Come, weak and unstable Come, know you are not alone O come, barren and waiting ones Weary of praying, come See what your God has done Christ is born, Christ is born Christ is born for you. O come, bitter and broken Come, with fears unspoken Come, taste of His perfect love O come, guilty and hiding ones There is no need to run See what your God has done He’s the Lamb who was given Slain for our pardon His promise is peace For those who believe So come, though you have nothing Come He is the offering Come see what your God has done”

(O Come, All You Unfaithful - lyrics by Lisa Clow & Bob Kauflin).

The song could not have come into my life at a more opportune time, in a season when I felt weak and unstable, bitter and broken, with many a fear unspoken.

As a little girl, I was taught that “Jesus is the reason for the season.” I knew that Santa and his reindeer and all those presents under the tree were just tinsel—that there was no Christmas without Christ’s nativity.

But it wasn’t until all that tinsel blew away in life’s storms that I truly appreciated what God did for us, as prophesied by Zechariah in Luke 1:69-75:

“He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets long ago),

salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us—

to show mercy to our ancestors and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham:

to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear

in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.”

This, my friends, is the assurance I needed during my first Blue Christmas, and it’s the promise I cling to when darkness threatens to steal my joy.

A Christmas Prayer

Dear Emmanuel,

This Christmas, I pray for all those who feel bitter and broken. Comfort the weary and waiting ones. Console the barren and brokenhearted. Grant rest to those who do not feel merry and bright. Emmanuel, meet us in our grief, our pain, and our unanswered prayers. Remind us that you are with us even when we feel abandoned or forsaken. Thank you for rescuing us from our enemies. Thank you for breaking the curse of sin and for offering us the hope of eternal life. Thank you that no matter how difficult our lives may be, we can still experience joy, peace, and hope in your presence. Sustain us with the promise of a better life to come, a life where we will serve you without fear, in holiness and righteousness, all of our days.

Amen.