Dear Oxygen readers,
The Core Team wishes one and all a blessed, peaceful and joyous Christmas filled with God’s graces and love. May He continue to light out paths and guide us on our journeys as we come to know Him more.
Christmas Day – Mass during the Day
Isa 52:7-10
Heb 1:1-6
Jn 1:1-18
The Word was the true light that enlightens all men; and he was coming into the world.
This year, I let things get away from me. I got caught up with trying to ‘outperform Christmas’, took on far too much and, as a result, squandered those quiet moments of reflection during Advent, when one is supposed to prepare one’s soul to receive the Good News. When I finally looked up from my ‘to-do’ lists, it was one week before Christmas and I was frazzled, annoyed and exhausted.
I am self-aware enough to realize that my need to ‘outperform Christmas’ stems from my fear of losing relevance. I used to derive my identity and self-worth from my job, and how well I performed it. Then I got married, and my husband moved us all back to the US, where one’s identity can be a bit of a grey area. I am technically ‘retired’, but I work just as hard taking care of the husband and the family. I am technically married, but I am not a mother in the traditional sense of the word as we don’t have children of our own. I don’t have to ‘go to work’, but I also don’t get any days’ off and am on call 24/7, just like I used to be at my old finance job. There are no quarterly performance reviews, but if I mess up even one family dinner, you can bet I’ll hear about it. All of these grey areas and dotted lines can make life unnecessarily complex. I guess you could say, like most mothers and wives in modern blended families, the lack of definition is something we all have to deal with; and no, there are no easy answers how to win at it. How do I stay relevant to my husband, my stepchildren, my own family back home, my in-laws? I am not sure I know.
So, when it comes to Christmas – something with a clear set of dates and defined performance measures – you can see why I might fall into the trap of trying to ‘outperform’ it. The rest of my life is so grey, but this – this I can do, and possibly do quite well too. But that is a mistake. Focussing on the ‘to-do’ lists, the presents, the flowers, the food — all of that is distraction from what the Nativity of the Lord is about. If we need further proof that all the faff is not necessary, our Lord was born in a manger, and received his first guests, the Wise Men, as he lay. The Nativity of the Lord is about being enough as we are. “From His fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace”. We are relevant to God as we are, He asks only that we believe and that we accept him. That is all.
This Christmas, this season, the temptation might be to do more, to outperform, to compete and excel. But that is missing the point of it. The message of the Nativity of the Lord is acceptance – we are enough. He sees us and meets us where we are. Maybe we can let go of the faff, and accept ourselves as we are too?
(Today’s OXYGEN by Sharon Soo)
Prayer: We pray for the wisdom to cease the things that do not lead to life everlasting, and focus on the things that matter.
Thanksgiving: We give thanks for God’s mercy and His grace. We give thanks for the people in our lives, our families, and the time we get to spend with them during the holidays. Let’s not make it about the material things.
OXYGEN 
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