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Another Christmas and New Year’s in the books, I said out loud. In the calm after the frenzy, I took some time to linger in front of our beautiful Christmas tree, minus the presents. It seems like this season, more than years before, everyone I observed, including this writer, started gearing up for the big day months before. I saw numerous posts throughout this year discussing upcoming plans for the holidays, talk of found treasures, favorite scripture quotes. We shopped Christmas in July sales, we watched QVC, we planned our decorations and we listened to holiday music in August. Decorations went up several days before Thanksgiving. They not only went up, they were lit and functioning. Did we all lose our minds? Had we been completely taken over by the commercial thugs?
Then it occurred to me why. We all needed to feel hope. There truly is a magic that surrounds Christmas and if at no other time of the year, people seem to feel it then. We are overwhelmed with jobs that demand too much, family life that can seem impossible, and a sense of loneliness in the middle of the masses. Even those who may only go to church once or twice a year realize that we as humans do not hold the answers. It can be easy to take life on like we have complete control, only to be stamped down. As hard as we all try to say “I got this”, we certainly don’t. We have an innate sense that something bigger than us is in charge, yet we fight it fiercely. We let ourselves be harried by the long list of things to accomplish and the people we need to please. Why, then, do we run after Christmas so hard? Again, it is hope and the peaceful feeling it brings. The birth of Christ gives us hope, a chance. It started humanity on the path to redemption. It gives us the incentive to get up each day and keep moving forward.
We may not truly know what day of the year Christ was born, but when we celebrate it, we seem to feel a little safer. We act just a little nicer. We put others before ourselves and we actually slow down, at least a little bit. Now if we can just figure out how to feel this the rest of the year, we might actually start to understand the true meaning of Christmas.
Happy New Year, Everyone! Make it Great and Let’s Strive to Keep Life in Perspective!
cmtreadway 