Merry Christmas (or Happy Boxing Day, at least) from our family to yours!
Isaiah 9:6
For unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulders; and He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace!
For Amanda, who’s been celebrating childhood Christmas memories this week: Me. Christmas. 1987ish.
Complete with Santa hat with my name in glitter, a cabbage patch kid (you’ve met my ‘kids’, remember? This is Blaine) and most importantly, my Junie, an indispensable part of every holiday and especially Christmas.
For more Wordless Wednesday, click here. Merry Christmas!
Romilly has been full of randomness lately. I don’t know quite how else to explain it. First of all, she has taken to calling us (exclusively) Mom, Dad, Pip and Bea. Apparently she is now too cool to call us by any more than a single syllable. At two months shy of three she has the most active imagination I have ever come across and is constantly coming out with gems like:
“Mom, I’m going to eat you all up! You’re spicy, but only a tiny little bit.”
and
“Mom, I’m a scary brown and black monster, and I’m going to scratch your back.”
But it is this recurring conversation that I absolutely had to record for posterity, lest I should ever forget it. We go through this almost word for word at least three times a day.
Romilly: Excuse me, Mom!
Me: Yes, Ro?
Her: I love you.
Me: I love you, too!
Her: I love you a most. (Sometimes she even embellishes to “a mostest”, which I might love even more.)
Me: No, I love you the most!
Her: (Like it’s a brand new idea every single time) Bofe of we can be a most!
Me: (Really excited) Okay!
Her: Bofe of we are a most, bofe of we are a most – yay!
Just like that, every time. I love this kid.
The other night, in my ongoing quest to expose the girls to Christmas carols, we were listening to Christmas music on the radio in the car (note to self: get a CD of them for next year! About one in ten Christmas songs on the radio on a good day has anything at all to do with Christmas… but I digress). The station had a feature in which children could call in and speak to “Santa” on the radio and tell him what they wanted for Christmas.
We listened as a 7-year-old boy named Hudson called in to speak to Santa. Santa first told him what a cool name he had (I have to agree there!). Then he asked him that ubiquitous question: “Have you been a good boy this year?” Without a moment’s hesitation, Hudson replied matter-of-factly but with a hint of sadness, “I don’t know.”
Santa seemed as surprised by this little boy’s honesty as I was, and scrambled to make something up about as long as he’s good for the rest of the holiday season and next year…blah, blah, blah… and went on to let Hudson reel off the all-important wish list. But I heard none of that. All I heard, echoing through my mind, was this poor, lost little boy who had no idea whether he had made Santa’s “nice list”, whether he had made the cut, whether he would get any presents at all.
It occurred to me instantly (and I will now be adding this to my list of issues with Santa), that this is how so many people think of God. Most kids would probably have answered an unhesitating and resounding “Yes!” to Santa’s question. Of course they’ve made the nice list. After all, most kids are not the ones who are always in trouble at school, the ones who beat up the other kids, the ones who swear at the teacher and have to stay inside at recess time every day. As long as those kids are out there, and they always will be, then everyone else can feel quietly confident that those kids will be the ones comprising Santa’s naughty list. And that leaves plenty of room on the nice list for the rest of us.
Is that how Heaven works? Does God keep lists of those who are good enough and those destined for someplace else? I guess many people these days do not believe in heaven or hell at all. If they do, or if they even believe in a God and wonder what will happen to them when they die, I fear that many, many people have a mental image of God, like jolly old St. Nick, keeping tabs on all their good deeds and bad for one final, fate-determining tally at the end. Most of these folks probably believe they will be okay. After all, most people haven’t done anything really bad, right? They’ve done more things right than wrong. They’ve gotten all the important things right, at least.
But Hudson was onto something. He knows he’s not the worst kid in school, but he also knows he’s not perfect. He disobeys his parents sometimes. He probably has said a few unkind words to his siblings here and there. Haven’t we all? He may be “a good kid”, but he also knows his own heart, and he knows it’s not all good. With a little bit of Hudson’s honest introspection, all of us can know this to be true:
“…as it is written: None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
“For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” (emphasis mine.)
Romans 3:10- 12,22-23
A naughty list containing the name of every person ever born, and a completely empty nice list, may not paint a very festive picture. But, of course, Christmas is all about the good news that is the antidote to the sad truth of our condition. Every human who has ever lived has sinned against God. Every one deserves to be punished. Every one… except one.
The baby born that night in Bethlehem and laid in a manger did not come to live a peaceful life as an example to his followers, although He did do that. He did not come merely to teach people how to live. He came to die for them. To live the perfect, spotless life that not one of us can live ourselves. God in His justice and in His incredible grace allowed His own son, Jesus Christ, to die for my sins and for yours. But that gift cannot be ours until, like little Hudson, we realize that we have not been good at all. We could never be good enough for God’s holy standards, not on our own, not outside of Christ.
The rest of the passage quoted above says this:
“24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. ”
Our choice is this: we can spend our lives wondering, if there is a God, have we done enough good and little enough bad to please Him, to beat the curve? Or, we can humbly acknowledge before Him that we could never do enough good to erase the many ways in which we disobey, dishonor and ignore Him every day. We can believe that Christ lived sinlessly, died in our place, and rose again. That He alone is on God’s “nice list” but that through Him, we may be counted as righteous as well.
That is news worth celebrating and reflecting on, especially at this time of year!
It is Thursday, isn’t it?
The poorly one and her faithful sidekick
The little entertainer
I’ve been finding myself very frustrated this Christmas season with how inundated we’ve been by the ‘non-real’ aspects of Christmas. Santa Claus (with all his trappings) seems to be an inescapable feature in the landscape of Christmas in America. Try as we might to make it all about Jesus, the truth of Christ’s miraculous arrival on this Earth with the purpose of dying for our sins does get a bit lost in all the gingerbread houses and reindeer.
In spite of all that, this brought a much needed smile to my face today in the midst of sick little ones and a heaviness of heart that I’ll share more about when I can. Just promise that as you watch it you will remember that Christmas is not about elves. Not at all. Okay?
I’m guessing that most people who read my blog do not even have any real concept of how long fifty years is. I know I don’t. It’s longer than I’ve been alive. It’s almost along as my mom’s been alive, and as of this past Saturday, it is how long my Aunt Mary and Uncle George have been married. Here they are, then and now.
We had the privilege of celebrating this wonderful occasion with them along with dear friends and family on Saturday afternoon. The girls had a wonderful time playing with cousins they don’t get to see nearly often enough. I got to see my cousins whom *I* don’t get to see nearly often enough, one of whom just had a baby of her own. The whole day was a blessed celebration of family.
To watch Aunt Mary and Uncle George in action, there is nothing extraordinary about their marriage on the surface of it, and yet, especially in this day and age, fifty years *is* extraordinary. What’s even more incredible is how easy they make it look. I pray God will bless them with many more years of health and true happiness together, and I humbly hope that Trevor and I can walk in their example of kindness and consideration of one another and to one day have fifty years to look back on together.
(If we are still around, just imagine how many failed Christmas card photos we will have taken by then!)
Naptime yesterday. Romilly had chosen a Beanie Baby dragon (called Scorch, or “Sporch” by her) as one of her naptime “guys”. Apparently she needed to know a little something about dragons in order to accurately incorporate him into her pre-sleep imaginary play regime, and we had the following conversation.
Ro: Mommy, what do dragons eat?
Me: (Unfortunately approaching the question as a game show contestant might, rather than a mother of a small impressionable child) Uh… princesses!
(Then, seeing the look of utter bewilderment crossed with the tiniest bit of terror coming over her face, I quickly back-pedaled. A little.) No, not princesses. Um… animals, I guess?
Ro: Animals? … (Still a little confused, but with a look of immense relief spreading over her face) Do you mean animal crackers?
Me: Yes, that’s right! Animal crackers. Dragons eat animal crackers.
Sometimes I think that girl has more sense in her head than I do.
(By the way, I just updated the post below about Bea’s allergic reaction – scroll down if you’re wondering. The nutshell version: She’s totally fine now!)
About a month ago, on our way home from church on a Thursday morning, we stood and watched this sidewalk being made for almost a half an hour, at Pippa’s insistence that we wait until they ”get on their knees” (we saw the knee pads waiting in the wings.) It was a fabulous learning experience for *all* of us, and Pippa told me it was “better than TV”!
For more Wordless Wednesday (including Wordless Wednesdays that are actually wordless), click here.
Thanks, Deb!
Thanks, KT and Shanna!
