Doing Christmas Right

Beloved:
 
    What Christmas shopping and baking I intend to do is done.  My sweet daughter set up the tree and hung the stockings.  The Christmas Day menu is less a meal than a spread of Sam’s Club appetizers.  If I weren’t so lazy I’d write it up and title it The Lazy Girl’s Guide to Christmas. 

    I’m not a scrooge, truly.  I love having my big kids home.  I love seeing our little kids so excited.  The baking and the music is a treat.  What I don’t like is the pressure, the sensation that something so joyful is also so expensive.  I don’t miss the dollars as much as I miss the peace of mind and contentment I am prone to squander this time of year, fretting to meet some elusive idea of the perfect Christmas. 

    You’d think it would help that I’m a preacher.  Of all people, I might be one to remember the point of the season:  preparation and gratitude.  Remembering our need of Christ in the first place and acceptance of Him into our midst is the real task of these days, should we choose to do them right and do them well. 
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    Of course, such work is not for the lazy – the lazy-minded or lazy-hearted.  So much fear and doubt to be cleared away.  Guilt and good intentions clutter every surface.  Longings I’ve refused to face for another year.  All just waiting, should I choose to make this the year I do Christmas right. 
 
~ peace & prayers,
pastor annette