Christmas Eve……. as I sat and wrapped presents alone, I struggled with signing the tag. I had always put “Love, Daddy and Mommy.” But tonight, I didn’t want too. I almost wrote, “Love, Santa,” something we had personally agreed would never happen. We would never replace Jesus with Santa.

The familiar knock and voice came, “But you were replaced by him. Why should he get his name on the gifts? He didn’t help to pick them out, and he has not even cared to ask about what you bought, caring more about himself. He doesn’t deserve his name on the gifts; doesn’t even deserve to watch them open them.”

Again? Really? Didn’t I just go through this battle with resentments last week when I had to stay up all night, ALONE with a sick a child? ALONE. Always alone.

I pushed the unwrapped presents aside and assumed the all familiar posture. On my belly, face down. And I let the tears come. I always started out this way. I knew God would give me my five minutes. It was Christmas Eve. Maybe tonight He would give me ten minutes to enjoy self-pity before He interrupted me. After all, it was not just an ordinary night; I was ALONE, and I DESERVED to feel all that I was feeling.

Faced down, I cried, “He left us. He is out having so much fun and being selfish and cares only about himself. He is not the man I thought he was. I don’t like him, I don’t want him back.” 

“Are you done?”

I cried louder. “Really? I don’t want to do this tonight. I don’t want to get my heart right. I WANT to be mad. I want to be bitter and resentful. I don’t want to see things through Your eyes. Can’t I just be hard in heart for ONE night and ENJOY MY PAIN?”

“No.”

I started to feel my resentments turn toward God. That got my attention. “Ok.” I wiped my tears and entered into my routine. 

“God I forgive my husband. I love my husband. I forgive my husband, I love my husband.” Over and over I repeated this until I was free of the hurt.

 

“I’m going to give you a gift.”

For the next hour, as I finished wrapping presents, I wept. Not with anger, but with compassion. As I wrapped presents for my kids, He spoke to me about gifts being given not because they are earned, but because of love. He talked to me about HIS gift to us, His Son. He shared WHY that gift was given, from love, from need, NOT FROM BEING EARNED. It was because of our value. And our sins didn’t make our value any less. That is what the enemy was trying to steal and kill with the resentments. The enemy would use my resentment of my husband’s sins, rebellion, and selfish choices to devalue him. Then I would no longer be a partner with God, fighting for my husband in prayer, but would instead be a partner with the enemy to keep my husband bound.

My husband didn’t need my resentments. He needed my compassion. My mercy. He needed my fighting spirit. When he was selfish, he needed my unselfishness. When he was prideful, he needed my humility. When he was rebellious, he required my obedience. At this season of our life, the man to whom I vowed my life, my commitment, my faithfulness, desperately needed my help.

He needed me to be his partner, not his enemy. He needed me to fight for him, not against him. He needed me to love him, not love my happiness more.

And I needed God’s help to keep me right, to stop the neverending desire to be angry, bitter, and resentful. I needed His strength to stop the impatience and weariness.

I made it through that Christmas, and many more. I encountered that knock and temptation of the enemy to try and get me to turn against my husband and place my value above his many more times. He still comes. Always with the same thing…to make sin steal a person’s worth. 

But Jesus paid the price for ALL mankind, and that is where the value comes from. He bought back the rights and adoption of ALL MEN if they so choose to let themselves be adopted.

2 Corinthians 5 NLT

16 So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know Him now! 17This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

18And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to Himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to Him. 19For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And He gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. 20So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making His appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” 21For God made Christ, Who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin,e so that we could be made right with God through Christ.

God gave me a gift that night. He restored the worth and value of my husband back to me. NOT because my husband repented and changed but because of WHO JESUS is. The price He paid for me, for him, and for you. HE gave us worth. Don’t ever allow the devil to diminish the gift: the price Jesus paid.

HOLD tight to your spouse’s value and worth as a child of God rather than the sins and choices they have made. This has the power to keep you in love, mercy, and compassion, guarding you against becoming cold, hard, bitter, and unloving. 

May God’s GIFT be revealed to you this season.

Merry Christmas!

Sheila Hollinger