John Lennon sings, “So this
is Christmas. And what have you done?”
What have I done to prepare
for Christmas? What have you done?
Christmas is a bit of a
schizophrenic holiday. There’s the busy
cooking, baking, shopping, cleaning, make everything perfect, Santa’s coming
personality of Christmas. And there’s
the Advent, slowing down, contemplating, preparing the way, and God with us side of Christmas.
Personally I don’t see
anything wrong with a little bit of schizophrenia in the holiday season. It’s only when the balance shifts to the busy,
at the exclusion of God with us, that we have a problem.
December is our busiest time at
work. Not only do our clients want to
get as much advertising as possible on the radio in December, but we also run
our biggest promotion of the year as a station.
We work to bring Christmas Miracles to families in need of some love
and help to make their Christmas season better.
By the time the week before
Christmas rolls around we’re all pretty exhausted. Late Monday afternoon another Manager came
into my office.
We were talking about how we
were both looking forward to a rest over the Christmas season. She made a comment about a book I had in my
hand. With a note of irony in my voice I
shared what I’d just been reading from Ann Voskamp’s book, “The Greatest Gift”.
“The miscarriage of Christmas
begins when anxieties crowd out space within simply to carry Christ. Make room; be a womb. Be a womb to receive Christ everywhere, and
it is He who delivers everyone. So you
let the last of the trimmings go. Cease
the pace to do, buy, produce more. Find
the calendar and erase. Somewhere make
space. And you can feel the space become
a sanctuary.”
We looked at each other and
laughed.
“So this is Christmas. And what have you done?” Have you made space? Do you have time to receive Christ as He
comes silently tonight?
Read the Christmas story
starting with Luke chapter 1 and read to the end of verse 40 in Luke chapter 2. Make space for Christ now.
Merry Christmas!
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