Its the holidays. My little down town is decked out in festive white lights, four out of five of my car presets are now dedicated to Christmas music, and red and green seemed to have exploded overnight. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas is a season about family and friends, giving and receiving, and indulging in the latest holiday coffee concoction.
I sat on Thanksgiving, with a new friend, at the home of a couple that she lives with. We were surrounded by their family of eleven, complete with grown children, spouses and teenage grand kids. Somewhere in the pre-turkey socializing we fell into talking about our own families. For both of us that included being in a separate state, and more importantly, having reasons not to go back for the holidays. Looking at the rowdy, laughing, teasing, and utterly welcoming group around us we also talked about the importance of adoptive families. One of my psychology books calls them 'fictive kin', the families and individuals that take you in as one of their own, despite the lack of genetic encoding to bond you. The conversation ended up being one of those deep moments that happens when you aren't expecting it, with setting adding a weight neither of us intended.
This year Thanksgiving struck me so poignantly. In the six years I have been in this state I have been blessed to have three different families adopt me, especially for the holidays. I have also spent a couple of holidays home alone, as those same families gradually moved out of state themselves. I have been attending the same church for close to two years. A place I love and have probably eight plus friends that I see weekly and hang out with outside of church. Of the three invites I got for thankgiving, none came from those closest to me. One was from a dear, but out of state friend. Another from the couple I work for. And the last from a new friend.
I want to state now that I am not writing for a pity vote. Nor am I writing as a rebuke of my church and friends. I am writing as a reminder, to all of us. It is to easy, in a season that has become as much about presents under the tree as those around the tree with us, to forget that not everyone has either. It is to easy to categorize the lonely or lacking, as only those individuals in homeless shelters, or at the other end of a toy drive. And forget that they are just as likely our neighbor. If we are to be called the body of Christ, we must take our eyes off the decorations and our own family challenges long enough to truly see those around us. Jesus offers love and acceptance. How often do we pass that on?
"By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another" John 13:35
