Christmas Gifts

I think most people who do laundry would agree--it's nice to find money when doing the wash.  Bonus bucks discovered, having tumbled out of someone's pocket, in the washer or dryer.  Last time I did laundry I found three dollars in the washing machine. It put a smile on my face. I felt lucky, like I won the lottery or something.

I know it's only three dollars, besides the fact that it was mine to begin with; it came out of my pocket. But it still felt like I won a prize. It always does when that happens--feels like an unexpected reward. Right away, though, I get smug. I think, "That's right! Whoever does the laundry gets to keep the spoils!" Then I feel like kind of a jerk.  But this time it was legit. The money was mine. More of a perk of forgetting to empty my pockets than anything else.

Today I saw two bluejays and a bright red cardinal in the tree right outside my window.  I had to smile, a big deep down inside smile, because I needed that encouragement.  I always do.  It wasn't anything I did that brought this present of loveliness into my life. I just got to receive it. A Christmas gift.

I am wretchedly sad that many people don't know how loved they are by God. The Christmas hymn of the year for me is, "O Come O Come Emmanuel."  The longing expressed in the words and melody is profound. I am thankful for this song at this time.  Because it brings forth what is often trapped inside me, and comes out in tears, as I listen to what is our common deepest desire.  It has been answered. Whether we know it or not.

Paragraph 1

The following is a paragraph, of sorts.  It is something I have challenged myself to do.  It is not in an effort to write for the sake of writing, but in an effort to preach the gospel to every living creature.  I am pretty tired right now; it is late. But I didn't want to go to bed without doing this. So I hope it makes sense.

We are born going away from God, out of the gate. When you go away from God, you go away from Love, from Truth, from Goodness. This is called sin. We are born into sin and we sin by our own will, because we continue to go away from God. We don't like the word sin, in my mind, because it carries connotations of self-righteousness on the part of the one saying the word--"sin."  We know instinctively that none of us are righteous, so when we hear someone talk about sin, we feel it as hypocrisy, and it is repulsive. But although self-righteousness, us trying to be righteous in ourselves, is repulsive and hypocritical, true righteousness does exist--in God alone. Sin must be pronounced, but not without remedy.  The remedy is not within us.  To be self-righteous is to be counterfeit. To find true righteousness, we need to turn back to God and be reconciled with Him.

Consequences

I almost feel like apologizing for writing about things that happened to me so long ago. I guess they are still very vivid, and emerge as somehow being pertinent to the topic, perhaps.

Back in those days, when I was maybe five years old, there was an ice cream man that came down our street in his white truck in the summer. I remember one time, my cousin Lindy was coming over to visit with her family. The ice cream man could be heard coming along before Lindy’s family had arrived, and my parents gave me two nickels and a dime (I think) so that I could get something for her and something for me.

I was warned to be careful, and not to lose any of the coins, or I would not have enough. I heard that instruction clearly, kept mulling it over in my mind, certain that I would never lose any of the coins. 

I carefully crossed the street in front of our little house to wait for the ice cream truck on the other side. Then, for some perverse reason, I began to toss one of the coins in the air. I dropped it, and it suddenly vanished. I thought surely I would find it easily, but I could not. It was not on the sidewalk; I could not see it in the grass. I panicked. Just then, the ice cream man pulled up to the curb.

You might picture the ice cream man as a jovial, slightly overweight fellow. Well, this guy was not. He was old, thin, wore a rather uptight ice cream man suit, and did not smile. Distraught, I tried to explain to him that I had lost one of my coins, but that my cousin was coming, and could I please just get two ice cream bars with the money I had? He was completely unsympathetic, even to such a nice little girl.

I am actually not sure what happened after that. I like to finish it out in my mind that I got a popsicle, the kind with two sticks, and that my mom broke it in half and we shared. I think that’s how it went. But I remember that my parents also were not sympathetic. After all, they had warned me, and I had not listened.

I mean, I heard them, but didn’t listen, didn’t heed their advice, didn’t take the warning seriously. I was careless, even prideful, thinking I had it all under control—until I didn’t.

But I was just a dumb kid--or was I? I knew what I was doing, or so I thought, and I messed up. Even at such a young age, and even though I was pretty "good," I still had faults.  One minute I was on top of the world, carefree, and well, careless. The next minute I was brought back down to earth, humbled. 

It was my fault, but, it was also just a thing that happens. A silly little kid can be a silly little kid, and really, we love silly little kids. But there are always problems in life. This is an example of a very small one.  The world is broken. We are broken. We are never really on top of the world. We are always about to fall, whether it is our fault or not.

Losing the coin wasn’t malicious, and I didn’t really suffer much for it. But I did learn something, and I still remember it all these years later. I learned that I should listen to warnings, heed advice from those wiser than me, and I learned to believe in consequences.

Longing

Because I want God to exist doesn’t mean that he does. Because I want him to know me and to accept me also doesn’t mean that he will.  Once I made the conscious decision to follow Christ, I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know if he would actually be there, and if I would fall away if he was.                           

                                                                      

I have always been interested in the truth. I mean the real truth, the basis for everything. When I think back to my little girl days, I feel like I was already that person, asking the wide blue sky, “Well, what are we doing here?”  I wanted to know what life was about. I was never all that interested in how things were the way they were, as much as why. 

 

I am extremely grateful that I went to Sunday school just a handful of times in my childhood, and that in those few visits, I learned some of the most important things in my life. The things I learned would literally carry me through my later teen years. They put boundaries around me. They told me some things I needed to know.

The random times I was in Sunday school, I learned three stories that I would never forget.  They were about the birth of Jesus, the woman caught in adultery, and the resurrection. I guess I learned about Palm Sunday, too. So, I was aware of Jesus from this time on.  

When I learned about the birth of Christ, it was tremendously special to me. I was a kid, maybe 7 or 8, but even then, Santa Claus was not truly satisfying. There was something not right about that whole thing...the greed, the gluttony...

On a very real level I was sparked to amazement and deep joy at finding out what Christmas was actually about! The angels coming to the shepherds in the field; Jesus, the Son of God, being born in a stable, the star, the wisemen. It made Christmas so meaningful to me, even though I didn't know the rest of the story. Even as a child I knew it was significant, wonderfully significant.  

I still remember that feeling, when I look up at the stars at night. Especially on a cold winter’s night. Looking up at the stars puts a lot of things into perspective.

When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers—
    the moon and the stars you set in place—
 what are mere mortals that you should think about them,
    human beings that you should care for them?—Psalm 8:3-4