Friday, December 2, 2016

My Christmas Letter

This is my Christmas letter.  Today I sold a nativity set at the shop.  She also bought a Santa.  Sweet woman.  She shopped carefully for a Santa that was smiling.

 We have no idea how our actions affect the ones around us.  This shopper made an impact on me.  I carefully wrapped each piece of the nativity making sure not to break the fine fingers of the porcelain figures, and gently placed baby Jesus on the very top.  We both agreed that was where He belonged.  And then she left with her bag.  Almost gone, she turned around and said, "I would like that Santa.  He's smiling."  Once again, I wrapped her purchase carefully and she tucked him in her nativity bag.
That's it for me.  Carefully selected, carefully wrapped and tucked in with a smiling Santa.  It just does it for me.  Get God first, make sure He's protected in your heart and then gather whimsy and joy and make merry.

Dad would go out in the pasture and chop down a small cedar, bring it in the house and we'd call it Christmas.  How simple life once was.  A little ole pasture tree, some home strung popcorn and a few songs on the piano.  But, just like the bag that walked out of the shop today, along with it was Baby Jesus and a smiling Santa.

I need to remind myself daily, hourly, moment by moment, that life is as good and as simple as I choose to make it.  Reflecting on my blessings I almost burst.  Looking at my dreams, I almost explode, and believing that I can tuck it all away in a small red bag with a smiling Santa nestled in with the Almighty God Himself just makes me melt in a puddle of Christmas joy.

I have friends in great need, struggling to make sense of burdens put upon them, I myself am struggling with major decisions, the stuff of life has piled high in places I would never have believed, but as I go through this next phase of the life I have been given, I will remind my self that I can make it simple for myself and those I love.  Joy comes when I least expect it, with the Almighty God always with me, a smile and a simple pasture tree.  Christmas is in the knowing.

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