The Soul felt its Worth....

Oh Christmas time. I love it, almost all of it. For the second year in a row we are participating in Advent Conspiracy. An attempt to worship God and love those around us in a way which reflects the event in which we are celebrating. Though all the activities and presents can get in the way of what's really important, sometimes I do worship God and love fully by baking cookies or buying a present. However, it is hard, very hard to walk the fence- to not give in to the rediculous amount of consumerisim this time of year, but still buy presents. To slow down and be with family - but celebrate with joy at like 9 different Christmas partys. To make memories with Christmastime traditions without the traditions becoming a to-do list a mile long. For example I love Christmas movies. I actually watch them year round. If I have a bad day, my happy feel good movie is ElF. And lately I've had many "bad" mommy moments where I let Grace watch Even more tv then she already does, because there is a Christmas movie on in the middle of the day. But the other day we were watching some Mickey Christmas movie and the jist of the story is that Mickey saves Christmas. Now we've actually watched several Christmas movies this season where someone Mickey, elmo whoever - saves Christmas. Wether it's finding Santa his missing magic bag or whatever, Christmas is at risk for not happening unless some cute and fuzzy creature comes to save the day! Now, Im not going to go nuts, I don't think those movies do much harm. And I dont mind santa or frosty or rudolph. I'm not going to keep my kids from enjoying those childhood traditions in attempt to stick with the "reason for the season". However- those Christmas saving movies erk me because....Christmas saves us.

My grandma, the other day, was telling me how she was feeling deppressed. She said she just didn't care about Christmas anymore. I knew she was feeling like she couldn't give much to us as gifts for Christmas and feeling bad about it. She said to me "at my age Christmas is just about Jesus' birthday- it's between me and God, I don't care much about all the other stuff anymore". And I know she thinks she has lost her "Christmas spirit" but really she actually gets it! This year what's important to me is PRESENCE not PRESENTS. And I wish she would understand that, because really she gets it she just doesn't know that she gets it!

Josh always says that his favorite line in O Holy night is " and the soul felt it's worth..." and it's my favorite too. The night Jesus was born, the night we supposedly celebrate by spending ourselves into debt (for our kids) and baking cookies that look like snowmen, was a gift of PRESENCE. Jesus gave us himself. He paved a way for us to know our loving creator. It was a beautiful, scandolous event that took place in a barn no less- and it was meant to restore our relationship with God - to give us life to the full. It was meant to make our souls -your soul- feel it's worth. When I give someone a gift, it's beacause I want them to know how much they mean to me. It's me trying to wrap up how much I love them and value them- to show how much they are worth. And that's what God did then, he gave us his son because he wanted us to know we were worth it. So that's my goal. I'm jumping off the fence, throwing everything else down the drain- I just want to pass on the message, that you are worth it.



p.s funny story that got me thinking- We, Grace and I, were baking Christmas cookies. I laid out all the cookie cutters and was explaining what each Christmas shape was, you know, Christmas tree, snowman, stars, reindeers. And she said "and where's Jesus?!!" She gets it too!!!