The Gift of Slowing Down This Christmas

The shopping lists multiply. The calendar fills with parties, programs, and obligations. We race from store to store, hunting for the perfect gifts, the right decorations, the ingredients for one more recipe. Our phones buzz with notifications about shipping deadlines and holiday sales. We stay up late wrapping presents, addressing cards, and checking items off endless to-do lists. The pressure mounts to create the perfect Christmas experience, to capture the perfect moments, to somehow make this season magical despite our exhaustion. In all this frantic activity, we tell ourselves we’re celebrating the birth of Christ, yet we’ve barely paused long enough to remember why any of it matters at all.

There’s an ancient story that speaks directly to our modern chaos. When Jesus visited the home of two sisters, Martha and Mary, Martha immediately busied herself with preparations. She rushed about, arranging the perfect meal, ensuring everything was just right for their honored guest. Meanwhile, Mary simply sat at Jesus’s feet, listening to his words. When Martha complained about her sister’s lack of help, Jesus gently replied, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better.”

How often are we Martha this Christmas season? We’re so consumed with doing things for Jesus—the activities, the traditions, the celebrations—that we forget to simply be with Him. We’re preparing the feast but missing the Guest of Honor. We’re decorating the party but ignoring the reason we’re gathering at all.

Mary understood something profound: presence matters more than presentation. She recognized that having Jesus in her home was the gift itself, not an opportunity to showcase her hospitality skills. She chose to receive rather than perform, to listen rather than impress, to treasure the moment rather than manage it.

This Christmas, what if we followed Mary’s example? What if we said no to one more commitment to say yes to quiet reflection? What if we spent less time perfecting our homes and more time opening our hearts? What if we put down our phones during family gatherings to truly see the faces of those we love?

The good news of Christmas is that God came near. He entered our world not in the busy marketplace but in a quiet stable. He was announced not to the influential and occupied but to humble shepherds watching their flocks by night. The first Christmas was marked by stillness and wonder, not by stress and striving.

Jesus Christ came to bring us hope—hope that we are loved beyond measure, hope that our worth isn’t determined by our productivity, hope that we can rest in His presence without earning it. But we’ll miss this hope if we’re too distracted to notice it.

This season, may we have the courage to slow down. To sit at His feet. To choose what is better. The dirty dishes can wait. The decorations don’t have to be perfect. The real gift of Christmas isn’t something we create through our efforts—it’s Someone who has already come, offering us the peace and presence we’ve been frantically searching for all along.

By Pastor Ryan Lenerz, First Baptist Church of Chariton