What It's All About

Wow! It’s hard to believe that Christmas is only a couple of weeks away. All around me, people are shopping for gifts, going to parties, etc. Me…well, I’ve been tied up with other things. And I haven’t even begun to shop. It’s not like I have a lot to buy for though. Financially, I can’t do what I’ve done in years past. And even though I struggle with the idea of not giving gifts to certain people, I will not allow myself to add another debt by using credit cards. I don’t think it’s wise. But you know, many people do just that. And then they struggle all year to pay off that debt. Sometimes they can’t pay it off in a year and they just add more debt each year. And this is really what the credit card companies would like us to do. We do all this for that one moment of feeling good. But what happens the next day? Do we suffer the big let down? The eye opener of knowing that somebody has to pay for all of this stuff. And the knowing that the somebody is going to be us.

Christmas is supposed to be about the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But somehow that focus has gotten lost in all of the hustle and bustle of shopping for the greatest gifts for our friends and family. I often wish we could go back to simpler times when it wasn’t all about the gifts. As a child I grew up poor. Our Christmas gifts usually consisted of some homemade outfit my mother made and maybe one or two other things from a few family members. Mama always had us sing Happy Birthday to Jesus before we could open our gifts. And I remember one year when we didn’t put up a tree. Instead we laid out an open Bible. When we would have the family party at my Grandma’s house she always made us read the story of Jesus’ birth and some other readings that always pointed to the true meaning of Christmas.  Gifts were pretty low on the totem pole back then. I think that  many people who grew up like me always wanted more for their kids so they went above and beyond what they should have. And like I said, they probably ended up in debt. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’ve done my fair share of overspending to make my kids happy. I wanted them to have things I never had. I wanted them to fit in, to not be made fun of. I suppose I thought getting something spectacular would somehow make them popular. That was something I always longed for, but never had as a child. Popularity. But here I am all these years later and I see how fleeting those things are. Who cares if you were the popular kid in school when you get to be my age? What you’ve done for the cause of Christ is what will stand the test of time. I often think about what people might say about me when I die. I would hope it revolved around what I did for others. An expensive gift will eventually be forgotten. It may wear out or become outdated within a year’s time. But the memory of an act of kindness can last a lifetime in some cases. And isn’t that what life is all about? Showing the love of God through our actions, not our words.

In closing let me remind you to remember the reason for the season...Jesus!

~jan~