‘E = MC Christmas’
“dealing with loss during the holidays”

by joshua scott zeitz

Seeing things from a different perspective is not always the easiest thing to do.

I remember several years ago, I bought my wife a camera for Christmas. It was one of those big fancy cameras with a big fancy lens.

I told my wife and children at the time, to make sure no one touches the lens because if you do, it could damage the camera and it will be very difficult to clean.

I really didn’t know much about cameras, I was more concerned with protecting my investment and didn’t want to see the thing get wrecked!

The next morning I awoke early and grabbed the camera.

I was excited to show it off to my wife by taking some pictures.

I took the lens cap off and was just about ready to start snapping pics of the family when I was dumbfounded!

The shock quickly turned to anger which quickly turned to me going on a rant, asking who it was that touched the lens in the camera after I specifically told everyone not to!

Everyone denied touching the lens.

I was more than a bit upset now and decided to go into the other room to cool off.

It couldn’t have been more than 30 seconds later before the revelation hit me like a ton of bricks and I hurried back into the room where my family was to grovel at their feet, begging for their forgiveness!

You see I had not yet put on my contacts that day and therefore the reason for the so-called foggy lens became abundantly clear!!!

I was a jerk and worse yet, I was dead wrong and a jerk!

I was so sure I was right, but I was sadly mistaken!

In our Christian walk, it can become easy to get blinded by things we are so sure about…

The topic I want to discuss today is loss.

Have you ever lost a loved one? 

Have you experienced that first birthday without that special someone?

That first Christmas?

A memory, a smell, a thought triggers you to think about the last moments you spent with that special someone, and it rips at your heart like a sharp dagger!

Losing a loved one hurts!

and grief is not a one size fits all event!

We all grieve in different ways and for differing lengths of time.

And if we aren’t careful, it can be tempting to think that someone else is going to have the same response as us…

This can be especially difficult within many of our church circles.

Perhaps the pastor teaches a message on grief, loss, or heartache and provides an easy 3-step process for getting over whatever it is that is weighing us down…

We take the message to heart applying the steps with fervency and getting over our issue.

We then run into a friend or a colleague from work dealing with a similar issue and we think they should be able to benefit from what we learned so we share quite passionately our 3-step process only to find out that it doesn’t work for the person, in the same manner, causing them and us to become quite discouraged!

Sadly within our church circles, it is all too often easy to spout regurgitated formulas in an attempt to fix the people around us and miss opportunities to love on and share Jesus with these same people!

When we look at how Jesus handled various situations within the Bible, He didn’t employ a one-size-fits-all approach, but rather took time to meet individuals intimately and uniquely!

Whether He was drawing a line in the sand, or placing mud and spittle on a man’s eyes, or having a personal meeting at night with a religious leader He was doing everything led not by emotion or formulas, but rather guided by Love, by His Father!

The Holy Spirit will do the same in our lives if we let Him!

He will comfort us so that we c

Support the show