Reminders of the Season

A Special Season for Many a Reason

During this time of year, we all hear the clarion call of the season—a resounding reminder to focus on the true meaning of Christmas relative to whatever you believe. Maybe for some, it’s a time for giving philanthropically. For others perhaps it's all about connecting with family and friends near and far. Maybe it's connecting with folks you haven’t seen for days weeks months or years; or on the flip side, it's stopping and connecting with someone right underneath your nose; like kids, spouses, significant others, or an ornery neighbor. We are besieged with cantankerous reminders all through this season to keep it sacred and special: Hallmark movies, TV sitcoms, tear-jerking commercials from far away children’s hospitals, special local news reports of some community social cause in action, messages from preachers and pastors from the pulpit, email and text messages from charitable organizations known and unknown to us, and of course Holiday greeting cards. Reminders that the season is special. I like to remind myself too, so I do little things to keep the season meaningful like baking Christmas cookies, keeping the house open for drop-ins (the reason for the cookies), giving gifts, decorating modestly, and exerting a little extra energy to connect with others. 

Giving, Chocolate, and the Love Apostle

For me, Christmas has always been about giving. My husband has grown to understand my need for, or gift of, giving. We might as well have a rolling account at Widman’s Candy Store because any visits to or from relatives or distant friends, especially during this season involve several species of chocolates delivered to these guests; especially the chocolate-covered potato chips or chippers.

The "season" is a reminder for me to give back because God gave to me first. The youngest of Jesus’s apostles, John is the love apostle. The other disciples would say, “Oh yeah. He’s the one Jesus had a special love for.” John says in 1 John 4:9-14 that the love of God was manifested on earth. In other words, it was visible, something one could see. But how so? He goes on to say the most amazing thing. He says that no one has ever really seen God, but because Jesus was born as a human being, Emmanuel God with us, we could see God then and can still see God now. God-sightings are perpetuated by those who embrace Christ and allow him to reside in them! By allowing Jesus to come into my heart by the Spirit, his love abides in me in such a way that when I love others, they are seeing God. Not me of course, but "love-in-action" is the visible Divine. What a lovely truth. I have had countless glimpses of God these past few months in others. 

Connections: Early Christmas

Although I don’t strive for perfection in decorations, I do strive for perfection in connecting well during the Christmas season. Before the DBS setback, I was fairly active socially with varying levels of friendship connection. My schedule has taken a toll on this important part of remembering to keep the season special. We cheated this year with an early Christmas melded into a Thanksgiving connection with a son from Minneapolis, two of Chris’ sisters, a brother-in-law, and Chris' parents. The Wisconsin travelers brought along cheese, spicy Chex mix, Spotted Cow, pumpkin pie, old fashioneds, tons of laughs, and of course Packer football. 

Connections: The Turkey 

For our pre-Christmas Thanksgiving celebration connecting with family, Chris purchased a fully cooked, just heat-it-all-up turkey dinner from a grocery, complete with a 12-lb turkey and all the trimmings. We pulled out his mother’s Christmas China and had a feast. I don’t know if it was the new game we were playing called Shut the Box or the old fashioneds, but somewhere along the route of “heating up” the precooked meal, a segment of time was lost. Everyone ate and everyone was grateful and complimentary to the “chef.” The Wisconsinites returned to cheese land that Friday and our son was still with us that evening for Thanksgiving leftovers. With a mouth full of chewy turkey smothered in gravy Chris asked my son and me for the truth, “Was the turkey as good as you all said?” My youngest and I looked at each other holding back grins and said, “It was a tad overcooked.” Chris blurted out an immediate, “I knew it!” And commenced to laugh and describe the turkey that the Griswold family served in the movie Christmas Vacation. Oh well, the connections with each other were more memorable than the dry turkey and the fully cooked grocery dinner came with three pounds of delicious gravy (apparently, they knew something). 

Decorations

I have always loved Christmas decorations as a reminder of the season, but I don’t strive for perfection. The extent of our decorations with my limitations and Chris’s busyness has kept them modest but comforting over the last couple of years. Basically, I have a fake tree with full out confession that I saw advertised during a Hallmark movie . . . a Balsam Hill or something like that. I also have about eight bins worth of snowmen, mini-trees and village homes, garlands, stockings, elves, and various different string lights with timers controlled by Russian operatives. The tree is a huge reminder of the season with many of its ornaments owning stories about Jesus coming to earth, the birth and life events of our kids, travel we’ve done to faraway lands, favorite sports teams and schools, new homes, and angelic visitations.

Visit from Elves

This year the decorations were a special reminder of some of that abiding love of Jesus that can be seen in others. We were overloaded and swamped with life and had one shot to get the decorations up, but had no time or energy for the feat. Well, somehow Santa got wind of it and sent elves to our house. They were in and out in a couple hours, after which Chris and I sat in our living room, looked at each other, and exclaimed, “What just happened?!” Our normal living spaces were now beautifully adorned with modest yet noticeable reminders of the season. It was 1 John 4 again (paraphrased), “No one has ever really seen God, but when others extend the love of God to people, we get a glimpse of Him.