It is December.  The last month of the longest year of a generation.  Inexplicably, the year 2020 didn’t contain any more days than any other leap year on record.  The hours weren’t any longer than they usually are, and the minute hand ticked on cue every 60 seconds.  The cadence of time was right on beat…but something has seemed off.  The year may not have had any added weeks in the calendar, but for many, it had added disappointments.  Adversity, frustration, and disenchantment have become somewhat of a “norm” and I have found myself surrounded by a world that is weary.

Have you ever been tired?  I mean, really, really tired?  Tiredness is usually something that can be cured by sleep.  The word weary carries something weightier for me.  I’m probably adding something to the word because the dictionary defines the two as synonymous; but when I hear the word weary, it seems like it denotes something that goes much deeper than a lack of sleep.  I can sleep 8 hours a day and still be weary.  Coffee, energy drinks, and even Vitamin C are of no effect when I’m weary.  Weariness, to me, speaks more to a lack of victories, a lack of good happening in my life, or a lack of things going my way.

The lens of social media has been a favorable filter for so many years.  Angles can make you look thinner, smiles and catchy hashtags often veil troubled hearts and broken souls.  Years of finding out the “perfect marriage” was in divorce court, or the “happiest” guy has committed suicide has slowly lifted the veil on the Facebook façade.  You know what I have found under the veil?  A weary world. 

People are angry, exhausted, and confused.  Politics has given “Christians” a license to be jerks.  I am a political junkie who follows politics closer than anyone I personally know.  If there is a topic in the news, I have formulated an opinion on it.  And it’s not a flippant one, it’s educated and calculated.  That being said, I will not sacrifice my testimony for Christ, or my influence to win a soul, on the altar of “standing for the right”.  People are too weary to have Andrew Gonzalez continually beating them over the head. 

This pandemic has brought us to dark place.  Many are without work, wondering how they will survive this financially.  Thousands are shut in, afraid of what could result from even minor human contact.  Those screaming at them for “living in fear” are typically ones who have yet to lose a loved one from it.  I’ve never seen a time when the pastors of our churches have been under so much scrutiny.  I know of some who courageously kept the doors open and have since been blamed when large numbers of their congregants contracted or died from the virus.  I know of some who carefully closed the doors for a period of time and been criticized for being cowards in the service of the Lord.  What a weary world we live in. 

And finally, I find myself thinking about those I’ve served this year.  They are typically the subject of my writing.  There are few things more exhausting than losing a loved one.  I’ve found that it really doesn’t matter which month they passed in, it all comes to a head during the holidays.  Christmas morning without him reading the book of Luke.  Family get-togethers without her pies.  Only this year, it’s not just the empty seats around the table that hurt; it’s the traditions we are doing without.  The lightshow we always looked forward to, the Christmas program at the school that’s been canceled, and gatherings that seem just a little too risky.

I look at students sitting in front of a computer screen, their grades lower than they have ever been.  Teachers racking their brains trying to establish some sort of normalcy.  Health care workers stretched to the breaking point.  A husband visiting his wife of 50 years through a closed window.  Pastors having their intentions and discernment questioned.  I see a weary world. 

One of my favorite Christmas songs, one that I sing almost every year, is O Holy Night.  A line in the song says, “A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices.”  Jesus came to a weary world.  Israel had experienced bondage and years of servitude.  They had been oppressed by Babylon, Assyria, Persia, the Greeks, and finally Rome.  But they always had hope.  Jewish daddies would tell the sons while working in the fields…hold on boy, there’s a messiah coming.  Jewish mommas kneading the dough would look at their daughters and say…things will get better, because there’s a messiah coming. When Christ was born, this was not the birth of just another baby.  This was the birth of Hope!  The birth of Peace!  The birth of Joy!

The thrill of hope is enough to cause me to rejoice.  In the midst of tired hospitals, and fatigued schools; empty pews and lonely holidays, I will choose to rejoice.  In a year where an invisible virus took the life of my Grandfather, an uncle, and several close friends, I will choose to rejoice. In the last few years, I was forced to confront my own brokenness.  I’ve forgiven and I’ve asked for forgiveness.  I’ve grown and learned just how sustaining the grace of God is.  I’ve confirmed that even in the hardest and darkest of times, God is still faithful.  And I am convinced that a renewed vision of Christ; who He is and what he came to accomplish; is enough to make even a weary world rejoice!

-AG