One for my single friends….or really for anyone who has ever felt like their world is telling them who they are is not quite enough.
I’m not someone who typically spends a lot of time talking or thinking about being single. Most days I like my life just as it is. But then we hit the month of December. This year I’ve been reminded that if you have a single friend, you should give them an extra hug for the holidays. Because December screams with a megaphone to those of us who find ourselves by choice or by life circumstances to be currently doing life solo…that we haven’t truly figured out how to be happy. For happiness, we need to find our special someone. It’s the season we get invited to parties and don’t know who to bring or not bring with us. It’s the season that family we haven’t seen in a year ask when we’re getting hitched. It’s the season the songs talk about being home for the holidays. It’s the season where Hallmark movies tell us that if only we can meet the special someone under the mistletoe our life will be a happily ever after. It’s the season where some of us long for a family of our own while others just wish our current family would accept us for who we are and not who they think we should be. And this year I’m just tired of seeing my single friends walk around in pain because their culture or their church community is telling them they are not quite as fulfilled or not quite as spiritual or not quite enough!
In traditional liturgical Christian practice, Advent is a season in which we lean into the idea of waiting. Waiting in the midst of the pain and confusion of a broken world. Waiting for God to show up to fix this mess. Advent is when we sit with our longings in the silent winter before Jesus makes his entrance. We give notice to the pain that makes us long for hope. As single adults, we are not strangers to longing. And some of us…want to or not…have had to learn to become friends with waiting too.
But the beautiful part of Advent, is that our waiting and longing is met with a Savior. A God who showed up…not in the way we expected….but as a kid from a small town who grew up in a culture where marriage was a universal expectation…and yet chose to live a life of intentionality and service to others as a single person. A man who was fully God…but also completely human…with all the desires and sexuality and longing for relationship that humanity entails…and chose a single life. Not because marriage was a bad pursuit…but because He was convinced that His life was about something bigger. He had come to show us what God with skin on could look like. What a love that was bigger than we can wrap our heads around feels like. He came to be our Wonderful Counselor, Almighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. He was about loving and healing and caring and forgiving and changing the world in ways that would far outlast his short 33 years on earth.
That is an inspiring and validating picture of Christmas. That Jesus is validating the option to choose to say…my identity is not found in my current relationship status….my life can be about so much more! Not because we ignore the longings or the seasons of waiting…or because we think marriage is a bad idea, but because we’ve found a bigger reason for living.
So this December, I’m choosing to claim a different message about my single status from the Christmas story for myself and for my single friends (and yes, I know this is not the only point…or the main point of the Christmas story…but I think it’s one we almost never talk about…).
This December, I’m claiming the message of freedom….
…freedom from believing the lie that I’m single because there’s something wrong with me.
…freedom to say I like being single.
…freedom to say there are some days I don’t love it so much.
…freedom to acknowledge each person’s unique story.
…freedom to say that whether in relationship or single….we all have shared joys and challenges where we can find friendship.
…freedom from feeling pressured to justify why I’m single.
…freedom from feeling like I need to work at dating in seasons when I feel happy to do life alone.
…freedom to pursue friendships with those who can be an adopted extended family.
…freedom to not be ashamed to live with sexual integrity in a world that tells me that’s not cool.
…freedom to not believe the myth that singleness somehow makes me less.
…freedom to say that I choose to make my life about something bigger than whether I have a significant other in my life.
Freedom to bravely say…I want my day to day doing life to be about living out God’s love and healing and caring and forgiving and making life just a little bit more beautiful each day. Freedom to say…my life as a single person can be a living breathing explanation that happiness and hope do not come from our partners…they come from the baby in the manger who modeled the most selfless love the world has ever known. Freedom to say that being single does not define who I am any more than what kind of ice cream I like to eat.
So…give your single friends a hug this December…and instead of trying to set them up….give them the gift of validation. Say thanks for modeling to our culture that fulfillment is not in relationships. Tell them some of the ways you see them uniquely bringing God’s love to the world in a way only they can. Thank them for serving their community in ways that often make them feel invisible. Be their advocate when you see others unintentionally imply that they could be a better person if they could find the right someone. Ask what their unique joys and challenges are. Thank them for living with sexual integrity in a culture that doesn’t value that. Show them they are loved! Say come join us in our family traditions…and give them the gift of an extended family. Tell them it’s OK that they are single…and they don’t have to explain to you why. Give them the gift of freedom of believing a different version of hope during the holidays.
