CHRISTMAS GIFTS 2014

Christmas morning at home; just saying that phrase, just you reading those words; brings warm, happy feelings to mind.  Smells of fresh baked “goodies”, “snuggly-ness” (is that really a word) from the cold outside world, family (whether large or just two of you), ornaments on the tree, lights twinkling like the stars in the December heavens are all part of those “mind pictures” you recall.

Well this Christmas morning was no different.  I usually learn a lesson or two around Christmas time.  Let me share what I learned with you.   

Christmas morning at our house is a time when Keva and I are alone now.  Once there were kids and Granny and sneaking presents under the tree or in their special place where they sit and watching the sparkle in their eyes when they open their treasures. But now it’s just Keva and I.  Oh, don’t start feeling sorry for us!  We are the happiest when it’s just her and me. We are weird that way.  If you know us at all you already know that’s a true statement.

Actually we are not totally alone.  This year there is Gracie, my faithful, loving dog who just wondered up to the back door of our house a few years ago and we sort of “fell in love”.  And there is Sissy the old gray cat who has been with us for years.    

Well you know Keva can’t let a Christmas go by without getting presents for the “critters”.  So this year she got Gracie a nice chewy toy so we can play “tug-o-war”.

“She will just love this toy.”, Keva said. 

Sissy got some toy rats with catnip inside.  “Surely she will like these.  All cats like this kind of stuff."

Well, you probably have already guessed what happened, but I’ll tell you anyway.

As we sat in the living room and opened our presents to each other, Keva got Gracie’s gift and gave it to her.  She totally ignored it.  And Sissy, well she would have nothing to do with the little toy rats.  She simply sniffed and in her “better than thou” attitude walked away. 

But you know what they did?  Sissy just walked over to me and started rubbing her head on my hand.  And Gracie jumped up in my lap and wanted to be petted.   Here comes the lesson.  Our pets, and our children and our loved ones don’t want the gifts we buy them.  Those things are nice but not what they want for Christmas.  They simply want to be loved by us.

A toy rat with catnip is nothing compared with a good scratch behind the ear.  A store-bought “tug-o-war” toy is just trash compared to being able to sit in your buddy’s lap.  Computers, Play stations, new cloths, gadgets are nothing compared to simply sitting down with you loved ones and sensing their true love for you.  When they give their time and attention to just you. 

Oh, if I could learn this lesson.  Oh, if I could forget about spending so much money and buying all the newest contraptions and just put my arms around the people I love and look them in the eye and listen when they talk to me.  If I could just give “me”.

The Father knew this.  He demonstrated this to us in order to teach us how to give.  You know the verse.  You have it memorized I’m sure.  “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son”.  And if you believe in the Trinity you know that the Father and Son and Holy Spirit are one.  When He gave Jesus He gave Himself. 

I hope Gracie and Sissy taught me a lesson this year.  I hope that all year long I will remember to give you the Christmas gift of “me”.  I know that sounds frightening but I hope you get my meaning.  I hope I will look at you when you are talking.  I hope I will pay attention to what you are saying.  I hope I will love you enough to give you what you want.

Merry Christmas. 

DROPS OF LOVE ON THE WINDOWS

You don’t see it much anymore.  But it was a quite common sight in my childhood.  The winter months would bring a season of cold to the normally warm Alabama country side.  Firewood which had been cut and stacked and allowed to cure during the hot summer month was brought in and placed in the fire place.  A roaring fire would warm the home and make it nice and cozy. Or perhaps you may have heated with gas space heaters or a floor furnace.  At any rate, the outside cold, the whipping Canadian wind, hindered only by a barbed wire fence somewhere along the border of North Dakota was somehow warded off by the warmth of the fire inside. 

The memorable sight which I am thinking of this morning was made even more prominent in the kitchen.  Mom would be cooking something.  Isn’t it funny how the kitchen will always bring about memories of Mom?  The warmth coming from the stove would enhance the warmth from the heater or fireplace and on the windows of the kitchen would form the familiar sight of condensation.  Drops of warmth, love and home ran down the window panes of those old houses.  It stood as a sign for all to see that the inside of this house was warmer than the cold on the outside.

We’ve come a long way in residential heating and cooling in 2014.  Insulated windows, central heat and air, hermetically sealed cubes of heating efficiency are where we live now.  No drafts of cutting frigid air, no single pane windows.  We are warm and safe and cozy.  We have done away with the condensation on the windows and threat from the outside cold.  Or have we?

Somehow I think the love and warmth of those old houses, some of which were so drafty with fissures in the doors, windows and walls so large you could “throw a goat through the cracks” has been left behind. Oh yeah, we have houses heated by all the luxuries modern man can imagine but where did the warmth go?  Back then you could look at the frost or the condensation on the windows and know that it was colder on the outside than it was on the inside.  In many of our homes today there is no difference in outside and inside. And in some cases our children feel “warmer” and feel more love outside the home than they do inside.  These things ought not to be. 

Our homes should be sanctuaries, strong-holds of love and safety to our children and grandchildren.  They should be places where memories of family, friends and God can grow.  They should be the safest place South of Heaven. I hope it’s so in your house.  I pray it’s so in mine. 

I hope this year during the cold winter months that your house will be warm.  I hope that your children will feel that warmth and love and that there will be condensation on your windows.  I hope there will be a visible, “feel-able” difference between the warmth and love in your home and the cold world outside.