White Christmas at Gold Hill Baptist Church 

Maria Bond introduces the thinking behind a reflective service her church holds in December for anyone experiencing the pain and loss of bereavement

Christmas is a very busy time of year, particularly if you are involved in church life. It can be full of extra events, parties for youth, special get-togethers for ministry teams, extra church services – and of course traditional carol services which are always a great opportunity for followers of Jesus to invite friends and neighbours along. It is a wonderful time of the year celebrating the birth of Jesus.

But – and there is a big but – if you are grieving it can be the most painful time imaginable. The sense of loss is often intensified as the celebratory culture engulfs the church – and indeed most of our society. The realisation that you no longer have to buy a present for that significant someone in your life; you will never receive a gift from them – or even a card; you no longer have them with you – often at the heart of your family traditions. Whether you have lost a spouse, a sibling, a child or a close friend – the gap that they leave seems even more cavernous as ‘everyone else’ around you is celebrating.

The reality is, that Christmas is a time of celebrating the greatest gift we could ever have imagined; the gift of the birth of our Saviour, who has given us life eternal. Nothing that changes in our circumstances can change the real “reason for the season”.

When my own husband died, in a May, that first Christmas was so difficult. I wanted to celebrate Jesus, I wanted to be involved in all the fun stuff, but there was such an emptiness even so.

We, as a church, decided that there needed to be a space, that was a safe space, for those who find themselves unbearably sad and empty at Christmas, to be themselves. To acknowledge the sadness and loneliness and to be able to cry and admit ‘this is so hard’. And so it was that we held our first White Christmas service during the afternoon of a Sunday in December.

We stick to familiar passages of scripture and traditional carols so that people from the community who may not have been in church for some years, can join in comfortably.

We try and have a message given by someone who has been through a  bereavement so that people know there is empathy. And there is always a time of reflection and quiet with some form of symbolic act.

For example, one year we had simple white plastic tree baubles on which everyone could write the name of the person they were grieving and hang it on the Christmas tree – this stayed in situ for the whole Christmas period. Another year we had wooden Christmas tree shapes to write on. One year we had little candles that were then remotely turned on all together at the end. (All these things are available online and are not prohibitively expensive).

After the service we provide tea and cake and a time to chat to others who are in a similar position. It is a good opportunity to connect with people in the community – as well as people in the church – to encourage them sensitively and just have some quiet headspace.


Some practical tips

• We try and hold the service in the second half of December – if it is too near the beginning of the month it isn’t really ‘Christmassy’ enough and people aren’t necessarily ‘in the zone’ – and it didn’t feel right somehow
• We let the local funeral directors know about White Christmas so that they can point people in our direction if they feel that would help
• Every year we run ‘The Bereavement Journey’ course which lasts for 7 weeks; we start this course in January, so the White Christmas service is a good opportunity to promote this course
• Our all year ministries to the seniors and also to widows is also a good avenue to encourage people to come along

Sample orders of service can be downloaded here and here.


Image | Julia Zolotova | Unsplash
 

Maria Bond is a member of Gold Hill Baptist Church in Chalfont St Peter, Buckinghamshire

This article originally appeared on the Faith in Later Life website, and is republished with permission. 

Faith in Later Life states, 'At Faith in Later Life we recognise that for many older people the loss of a loved one is often magnified by the unique circumstances that can accompany later life. We are therefore extremely grateful to Maria for sharing something of her personal story, this beautiful idea to bring comfort to bereaved people of all ages at Christmas time and through the year, along with her helpful tips and service orders.

'If you have a story to share of how your church is making a difference to support older people, please get in touch'


 

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