When Christmas Uncovers Difficult Memories
Snow began to tumble from the sky as I paced the living room floors. Our toddler slept in his bed and my husband eyed me nervously. I was thirty-seven weeks pregnant, and contractions had been coming and going all morning—but they seemed minor and inconsistent.
“Lara, I think we should go in,” Daniel said, running a hand through his hair. “Can I please call my mom to come watch Levi?”
I grimaced as a contraction came and slowly dissipated. “No,” I said, “It’s probably nothing.”
He exhaled loudly. “I don’t want you to go into labor here, and I don’t want to drive in a snowstorm. Please, can we go?”
I finally agreed, and we went to the hospital. Eventually the contractions became regular. But something started going wrong.
“Baby B’s heart rate keeps going down whenever she has a contraction,” a nurse said to my obstetrician. His heart rate dropped three more times, and I was taken for an emergency c-section.
““Baby B’s heart rate keeps going down whenever she has a contraction,” a nurse said to my obstetrician. His heart rate dropped three more times, and I was taken for an emergency c-section.
”
We welcomed our twin boys into the world seven days before Christmas. After five long days in the hospital filled with weighings, bloodwork, IVs, and blood sugar checks, we were finally released with the ominous words “Your family doctor must weigh them every few days. If they aren’t gaining weight, you must come back. And we might need to do feeding tubes.” I drove home in tears. I tried to enjoy our first Christmas with our twin boys, but I felt suffocated under numbers, breastfeeding, pumping, bottling, and sleeplessness.
As the Christmas season approaches, those memories are beginning to make their way back into the forefront of my mind. Perhaps you have your own difficult memories knotted into this holiday. Maybe you’re worried about the tensions that might arise around the dinner table this year. Maybe you’re reminded of something that isn’t as it should be or a tragedy that grieved your family one Christmas. The pandemic alone has made difficult memories for many.
How do we quiet our hearts to enjoy Christmas this year? How do we find the peace that was announced on Christ’s birth? How do we keep our eyes set on Jesus when dark clouds seem to hide his face? I think of Mary, the mother of our Savior, and the example she left us.
Treasuring and Pondering
“How do we keep our eyes set on Jesus when dark clouds seem to hide his face? I think of Mary, the mother of our Savior, and the example she left us.”
It’s unlikely that Jesus was actually born on December 25, yet we consider his birth the first “Christmas.” Even this first Christmas was stressful. Many people probably scoffed at Mary and Joseph because she was pregnant out of wedlock (though we know it was the Holy Spirit who formed Jesus in her womb). They had to make a long, tiring trip away from their home while Mary was late in her third trimester. They couldn’t find a place to stay the night, and the only room in an inn meant residing with animals. She gave birth among stalls and hay, the only bed for her child being a feeding trough. Mary cried out and heaved against the pains of childbirth with animals lowing nearby. And while we know what a beautiful, awesome, and profound moment this was, it likely filled this new mom’s heart with fear and confusion.
Yet how is Mary described? We find her treasuring and pondering it all in her heart (Luke 2:19). I wonder if in her heart—along with the many promises and predictions declared about her son by angels and shepherds—Mary thought on Psalm 131 as she nursed her newborn babe, the Savior of the world:
Oh LORD, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.
Oh Israel, hope in the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore. (Ps. 131:1–3)
What if this were our prayer this Christmas? I often get caught up in the whys. Why did God allow such a stressful birth? Why did God allow one of our twins to be so small and struggle so much? Why did he allow breastfeeding to be so difficult? Why did he allow my mental health to suffer so much during this?
Yet I’ve learned these answers are too great and marvelous for me. I need to settle my heart on what I do know and what God has given me: Jesus Christ came to earth to die for me. Despite all this suffering, he says he loves me, and he is near to me.
Knowing the promises of the gospel doesn’t mean all my fears melt away or that my grief over what isn’t as it should be will slip from my heart. Reflecting on the marvellous ways of God doesn’t mean my longings for something different will evaporate. But even as those difficult feelings tumble in our hearts, we can look to Christ this Christmas, as we can every day. Rather than grasping for control over circumstances our tiny hands can’t hold, we entrust them to the One who is good and sovereign over it all. As believers, we can grieve this broken world while remembering the hope the incarnation gives us.
Considering the Incarnation
Difficult memories around Christmas can bring with them the feeling that no one understands us. While everyone else celebrates and rejoices in the get-togethers, extravagant meals, and presents, we find ourselves weighed down with dark memories. Sometimes our suffering can feel so unique and strange that even our closest friends will shake their heads and admit they don’t understand.
These feelings can extend beyond our human relationships toward God himself as we wonder how a perfect God could possibly understand. How can God, who doesn’t suffer, understand what it means to cry yourself to sleep night after night? How can God, who lives in perfect harmony within the Trinity, understand the grief of loneliness and betrayal while everyone joyfully sings Christmas carols?
“How can God, who lives in perfect harmony within the Trinity, understand the grief of loneliness and betrayal while everyone joyfully sings Christmas carols?
And yet, he does. ”
And yet, he does. That’s what Christmas celebrates—that God understands. “The Word [Jesus] became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14a). Because of this reality, we can have hope in our suffering that we aren’t just heard by God, but the ear that bends low is also sympathetic. As Michael Horton puts it in his book, Putting Amazing Back into Grace:
In the person of Christ, God ‘dropped in’ on his rebel creatures. He came into our living rooms, our wedding receptions, our places of business. He ate with us, drank with us, laughed with us, and cried with us. The apostles testified not to having experienced a man who walked with God or who somehow became divine, nor to a god who looked and acted like a human being, but to the man who was God and the God who was man. (Horton, Putting Amazing Back into Grace)
Likewise, the author of Hebrews describes Jesus as our sympathetic high priest. “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:15–16). When we cry out in distress, fear, and confusion, we know we’re heard by One who knows the strains of ordinary, daily living and the darkest extent of suffering.
When we feel abandoned by God, Christ likewise felt abandoned when his Father’s wrath was poured out on him on the cross for us. But because of his sacrifice, our Heavenly Father will never abandon or forsake us. He will carry us through to eternal life in his presence. As we often sing during this time of the year: “He comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found.” And one day we’ll be united in glory with him, where “no more [will] sins and sorrows grow nor thorns infest the ground.”
These past years have showered suffering on many of us in one way or another, some suffering which is new and unique to us. Perhaps you’re a new mom to premature babies too, and you feel like Christmas is clouded over with grey clouds of hard memories. We can grieve what wasn’t as it should have been. But rather than prying into the painful “whys” of our difficult memories, we can rest our minds on what we know is true: Though our pain and suffering aren’t erased, they’re known by our sympathetic Savior—who took on human flesh to save us from this cursed world and the sin that defiled it. Let’s pause to treasure up these realities in our hearts as we come to Christmastime.
Lara d’Entremont is a wife and mom to three from Nova Scotia, Canada. Lara is a writer and learner at heart—always trying to find time to scribble down some words or read a book. Her desire in writing is to help women develop solid theology they can put into practice—in the mundane, the rugged terrain, and joyful moments. You can find more of her writing at laradentremont.com.