Difficult Seasons

We had our annual Service of Remembrance yesterday afternoon.

A Service of Remembrance is something our church has done for lots of years on the Sunday before Christmas. It gives us an opportunity to come together and say out loud that there are dear people from our lives that are missing as we celebrate the holidays. Some of those we have lost died this year, and our pain is still intense. Some passed years ago, but there is still a hole in our hearts that can’t be filled.

The service itself is simple. We sing a few songs together, we listen to some other songs. We pray a prayer of remembrance together. We have responsive readings of scripture that emphasizes the hope we share. And the central part of the service is the lighting of the candle of remembrance, after which each person takes turns coming to the front of the chapel and naming the person or persons they’re remembering this year.

We recognize and remember that the reason for the season, the first coming of Jesus, provides the hope of our being reunited with those who have gone before.

After the service, we hang around, sharing some seasonal refreshments, some hugs, and some stories. We are bound together by our feelings of loss and hope.

It’s an emotional time, but amazingly healing. It’s an important time for many of us.

May you be blessed with wonderful memories, reassuring hope, and wonderful friends this Christmas season!

Young People Singing in M.D. Anderson Lobby

Visiting just one patient wasn’t why I went to the hospital this afternoon.  I went to visit six patients.

It wasn’t that I didn’t have enough time to visit six patients today, although sometimes situations arise where I can’t visit everyone on my list. But today wasn’t one of those days.

Today only one patient was available. The patients in the first two rooms had been released. The third person on the list was out of the room for a procedure. The fourth patient’s room was also vacant. I did get to say “Hi” to the fifth patient as he was being wheeled away for a test.

When I reached the sixth room, the patient was in! In fact, she, her husband, her son, and the nurse were apparently having a conversation about chaplains coming to visit. As I introduced myself, the nurse said, “See, I told you that we have people from all different groups that come!” I came as a representative of their faith tradition, and for many of us, that’s like having family show up. It was for them. It seemed like they had just been waiting my arrival.

As I got to know a little about them, the husband reached over and picked up a Bible. He wanted me to read the handwritten inscription signed by the elders of their home congregation. It was a message of honor and belonging. We talked about prayer, about moving from hopelessness by the physicians over her condition to hope that led to surgery with a hopeful report. We talked about the importance of faith in times like this. And we prayed about what was on her heart — getting well enough to be with family and church. Even so, it was a short visit — maybe 10 minutes total.

Later I was talking to a colleague who is much more experienced in hospital visitation than I, and he remarked about how unusual my day had been.

The day was unusual enough that I spent a little time reflecting on what I should take away from it. I decided it’s really just one thing. Numbers don’t matter. But being there to represent God and church does matter. A lot.

We live in a culture where we’re told “More is Better!”

More is Not Better ©2009 Jim Hughes

The slogan sells stuff, but often is just not true. In fact, more is often worse.

Take megapixels, for example. Camera manufacturers know that most people believe that the more mexapixels a camera has, the better it is. That’s true to a point. But beyond that point (generally between 10-12 megapixels), noise increases significantly, actually providing worse photos. You’re now seeing some high end camera makers reducing the number of pixels to improve photo quality.

In the 1950′s and 1960′s, more speed in jet fighters was assumed to be good. That was true until a speed was reached at which the fighters could no longer maneuver effectively to participate in a dog fight. So the push for more speed ended. Enough was enough.

There are so many areas of life in which, once there is enough, more can be bad. How about a little time this Christmas season thinking about where in your life less might be better, more might be bad?

This time of year there just seem to be more grey mornings. It can make for difficult days.

Bright sun just seems to make such a difference in how we feel, and how we are able to deal with our aches and pains — physical and emotional. Grey mornings seem to accentuate the aches, the pains, the emotions. Light makes such a big difference.

I’m working to add more light to my life, especially on grey mornings.  Sometimes it’s as easy as flicking on a few light switches. Other times it means choosing to look at light, such as the photo below. And sometimes it’s choosing to turn on an emotional light.

Hope you’re seeing the light today — and not the grey fog currently enveloping Houston.

High Blue Sky (© 2009 Jim Hughes)

Fragile

My friend Virgil Fry, Executive Director of Lifeline Chaplaincy, wrote a really good post on here and now this week. I especially found his words about holding those we love vs. clinging to those we love helpful.

I hope you enjoy it!