Great Expectations

Did you know that most relationships fail? Indeed, statistics show that a boy and a girl will most likely break up rather than stay together forever. I think if we think hard about that we can easily agree that this is true. But we should dig deeper. What causes relationship to die? Now you can google it, and many things show up, but the majority focus on one major thing. Lack of communication, and with that it got even more specific; unmet expectations.

The problem with this is that surveys show that these unmet expectations are often because these expectations go unspoken. An example; Boy is mad at girl because boy expected her to show she cared by cooking, rubbing his head, or buying him gifts. But he didn’t want to feel like he is needy, so he didn’t express what he wanted to her. So when she didn’t do all these things, he got mad at her because he didn’t think she loved him. But how could she know those things, if he didn’t make his expectations and desires known? The answer is that she can’t. Bad communication kills relationships.

This happens in other areas of life too. As the pastor of First Reformed Church, I told people that I was going to be different if they wanted me to be their pastor. I was going to be different in the ways I pushed, my leadership style, and overall approach to shepherding a church. Not in a reinventing the wheel type of way, but in a personal style type of way. Now everyone has different expectations, and everyone always says you can’t please everyone, but we often try. We like to please everyone, but we can’t often meet all the expectations that are given to us. We all expect different things, but if we don’t ever share them, then feelings get hurt.

This brings us back to relationships. Another relationship that fits this season is our relationship with God. No other relationship can get in the way of that. No spouse, no friend, no pastor, not anything. But what do we expect from God? Do we expect that everything will go alright? Do we expect that nothing bad will happen? What do we expect? Do we know what God expects? I think that is an easy question to answer, but a hard one to swallow. God expects us to love our neighbor (not just the ones we like), to love our enemy, to help the needy (not just write a check for others to do the actual helping), to evangelize, to welcome the stranger, to be hospitable, and to obey his commandments.

The thing to think about this weekend is that we need to keep our expectations in check. Mad about Christmas without snow, Jesus didn’t have snow when he was born. Sometimes the things we want most, aren’t what God wants. Sometimes we lose sight of what we have, or things that are good for us, because we wanted something different. It’s easy to lose sight this time of year, when we take our expectations how the world gives them, but this year, let us keep our expectations in line with God’s plan for our lives. To grow the kingdom of God, by reaching the world and telling about God’s love. Christmas is more than a holiday, it is news of a God who loves. It’s a message to share.