Pastoral care for pastors takes center stage in this special Christmas reflection as Steve Thomason offers church leaders a rare gift during the busiest season of the year: permission to let go of perfect. If you've been working nonstop since September with rally days, sermons, hospital visits, and board meetings, you know the weight that builds as Christmas approaches. The pressure to make everything spectacular for people who'll only attend once all year can feel overwhelming. But Steve invites leaders to remember what really happened that first Christmas night—not spectacle or perfection, but the raw, ordinary mess of childbirth in a stable where God chose to enter the world.

Drawing from the Gospel of John and Paul's letter to the Philippians, Steve reminds us that Jesus didn't own a home or get worked up about buildings and budgets. He had a simple call: proclaim God's kingdom and invite people to love God and neighbor. This reflection offers weary church leaders a blessing of simplicity, inviting them back to that stable scene where a young couple, displaced strangers finding shelter among animals, brought God into the world through the same painful process we all experience. It was normal, messy, and beautiful—and pastoral care for pastors means remembering that you are too.

Hey Church Leader I'm gonna offer you two things that you probably don't get very often. First, I just wanna say thank you. I mean, you've been working so hard. You think back to the beginning of September. You remember Rally Day, or that big fall kickoff event that you had? A lot has happened since then. I mean, you've been writing sermons.

planning worship, teaching classes, having board meetings. I mean, you've been visiting people in the hospitals, weddings, funerals, baptisms, community organizing for social justice. You've been trying to take care of aging buildings and aging people, and there is so much going on. And yeah, by the way, you also have your own personal

family and friends to tend to. And now Christmas is upon us and it's just going to get busier. I'm tired just listing those things. So let me say it again. Thank you. Thank you for all that you do. You do so much for your people. Let me offer you something else that you probably don't hear very often.

I'd like to give you a blessing. In this moment, it's just you and me.

I invite you to just take a deep breath with

Now if you're listening to this while you're driving your car, don't close your eyes. But you might want to actually pull over or listen to this later when you have a chance to really be still and to become present.

Now let's breathe again, nice and slow.

As we come to the celebration of Jesus' birth, I'd like to remind you of a couple things that I've noticed in this story. I find that these details are really important for me to remember.

Think about that holy family. Mary and Joseph, they were just a young couple from a backwater town. They didn't have much.

and their relationship was overshadowed by scandal. Joseph stuck with Mary when other men would have just dismissed her because of her sin. And Mary, she bore the brunt of those people's sideways glances and she bore it with dignity.

Now to add insult to injury, the Roman emperor forced everyone to leave their homes to travel long distances to this faraway place called their ancestral city. Joseph and Mary, they were displaced strangers, political refugees who were in a strange crowded town just trying to find a place to sleep.

They ended up in a stinky stable tucked between a donkey and a goat.

Think about that night.

Their bodies are sore from a long journey. Mary's back's probably killing her from the Braxton Hicks contractions that have been started along the way. And Joseph, he just feels helpless.

and they're probably homesick.

It's simple and plain.

And then the time comes for the baby to be born. Now, I was present for the birth of all four of my children. And I have to say, childbirth is not glamorous. mean, Mary is screaming and squeezing Joseph's hand. And Joseph is just looking on, not knowing what to do. There's blood, there's water, there's a mess. Then they are exhausted.

and exhilarated. Wow.

Now let's think about what happened in that moment. The Gospel of John says that in the beginning was the Word, the Logos, the very idea of all of creation, the spoken Word of God, the blueprint of the cosmos. And that Word became flesh in this baby Jesus and dwelt among us.

And the apostle Paul put it this way in his letter to the Philippians. He said, though Christ was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself. Taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness, he humbled himself.

Jesus came as a simple baby, born through the same painful, messy way that you and I came into this world. There was nothing fancy about it. There was nothing perfect about it. It was normal and messy and beautiful. So here is my blessing to you.

You are beautiful in all of your normal messiness.

Precious church leader, there is a lot of pressure on you to be all things to all people. And that pressure gets ramped up to the max during this time of Christmas. mean, people are going to attend your Christmas Eve service that you know this will be the only time they step into your building all year long. You want it to be spectacular. You want it to be perfect. You want it to be something

that everyone will cherish.

listen to me. Take a deep breath.

I don't think Jesus really cares that much about all that stuff. When I study the life of Jesus, I see a simple man. He didn't own a home. He didn't get worked up about buildings or board meetings. He had a simple call. He proclaimed the good news of God's kingdom, and he invited people to love God and to love their neighbor.

My blessing to you this Christmas is that you would be able to take a deep breath, actually multiple deep breaths, and let go of the need to be perfect or spectacular. Go back to the stable. Sit with that little family in a dark and stinky animal pen. Bask in the simplicity of that scene.

Watch those new parents for a moment. Joseph looks with wonder at this little, tiny, wrinkly body. And then he looks with even deeper wonder at this amazing young woman who brought this child into the world.

Mary holds the infant in her arms as he draws life from her breast. And their eyes connect and love radiates between them.

Now my prayer for you is that this Christmas you would be able to find yourself in the loving arms of God.

The one who brought you into this world holds you and looks you in the eye and says, you are my beloved child. I love you.

It's it's ordinary, and it's beautiful.

So, dear leader, thank you for all you do for your people. And may God bless you with simplicity this Christmas.