What's It All For?

Get the tree.  Make the cookies.  Buy the presents.  Take the (torturous) family pictures.  Send them out.  Go to the Christmas parties.  Wrap the presents.  Try to remember if there are other presents stashed in the house that you forgot about.  Buy the ham.  Shop for Christmas outfits.  Buy film for the camera for Christmas morning.  Charge the camera battery for Christmas morning.  Make sure your phone is charged to take pictures on Christmas morning.  Stop eating the Christmas cookies.  Try to lose a few pounds before December 24^th when you will see all of your family.  Eat an entire batch of Spritz cookies.  Get to the post office to send out-of-town gifts.  Go to school concerts.  Endure said band or orchestra concert with elementary or middle school students, while your mind is mentally going over all the things you need to do (and secretly hoping your ears are not bleeding from the sound).  Try desperately to finish the things on that list.  Fall into bed each night, exhausted. 

Is this what the Christmas season is for?  Each year, we look back and vow to make next year different.  Have we ever made the next year different?  Have we ever had a Christmas season that we look back on and say, “Yep, I kept Christ as the center of Christmas and we didn’t get caught up in needless and stressful things.”? 

What if Christmas looked like this- Get the tree… or not.  Decorate it or not.  Make Christmas cookies or not.  Play soft instrumental Christmas music (Pandora has a great station).  Go to school concerts and really, really pay attention to your child.  Buy presents or not.  Buy new Christmas outfits or not.  Read an Advent scripture passage each day, or every few days, or just one time before Christmas comes.  Make hot cocoa and popcorn and snuggle in to watch a Christmas movie.  Stop what you are doing (no matter what it is, everything else can wait), take your child’s face in your hands, look into their eyes and tell them that the God of this universe loves them so much that He sent His Son to earth, for the purpose of dying to save us, because He did not want to be separated from us.  Now really, go and do this.  GO!  Even if your kids will think you are super weird, embrace your inner weirdo and do it.  And lest you think I’m just barking out orders I did this with my daughter.  She, of course, looked at me with an, “Okaaaaaaay….?” Look on her face and said, “I know, Mom.”  And guess what, she will remember it.   

This is why we have Christmas.  Christmas isn’t about cookies.  It isn’t about decorating a Christmas tree.  It isn’t about driving around looking at Christmas lights.  It isn’t about opening presents on Christmas morning.  Christmas actually isn’t even about being with family.  Christmas actually isn’t even about giving to others.  That may sound really blunt, but Christmas is about God.  It’s about the Father loving us, how we turned our backs on Him and walked away, how He had a plan to stay connected with us, how He put that plan into motion, how He sent His Perfect Son to earth (a pretty rotten place if you really look at the scope of it!), for the sole purpose of dying so that we would have the chance to be united with Him forever.  Boom.  THAT is what Christmas is all about.  That’s it.  Even Christians, CHRIST FOLLOWERS and LOVERS OF THE LORD make it about more than this, myself included. 

But Christmas is about God.  Let’s remember that this season in whatever we are doing.  Christmas is about God.  It’s not about us.  It’s not about who we see or the presents we give or the food we eat or the Christmas cards we send or the money we donate or the decorations we put up.  It’s about God. 

But I am a practical girl.  I am going to do a lot of those things.  So let’s keep GOD in the direct center of all that we do.  Let’s go look at Christmas lights and tell our kids that we can shine the light of Jesus just as those Christmas lights shine.  2 Corinthians 4:6 tells us,

For God, who said,

“Let light shine out of darkness,”

made his light shine in our hearts

to give us the light of the

knowledge of God’s glory

displayed in the face of Christ. 

Let’s make sweet Christmas cookies and tell our kids what Psalm 19:9-10 says,

The fear of the Lord is pure,

    enduring forever.

The decrees of the Lord are firm,

    and all of them are righteous.

They are more precious than gold,

    than much pure gold;

they are sweeter than honey,

    than honey from the honeycomb.

This Christmas let’s give gifts to others and tell our children that we give gifts because God gave the ULTIMATE gift.  Romans 6:23 tells us,

For the wages of sin is death,

but the gift of God is eternal life

in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Christmas is about the Father, giving us the best gift of all, wrapped up in a simple cloth for anyone who would reach out their hand and simply receive this gift of eternal life. 

And there you have it folks, that’s what it’s all for.  Easy peasy.