Christmas crunch

I opened a kitchen cabinet and found 3 Barbies and a sticky, greasy lid to some missing crock pot.  I was at my mother's apartment last Saturday, helping her pack up as movers were wrapping furniture in cellophane to keep drawers from opening on the truck.  And I found random item after random item in unexpected places.  It makes perfect sense actually, because, as you may have guessed, my mom is the definition of "random".  (I appear just under her, as the second definition. :)

At any rate, packing boxes and moving my mom is not what I thought I'd be doing the last weekend before Christmas.  It's not necessarily what I wanted to be doing, either.  But there I was, just the same.

My mother and stepfather are struggling.  I know I've blogged about them before.  My stepfather has Parkinson's and dementia and my mother is his primary caregiver.  Sounds pretty straightforward, typed up in one neat little sentence like that.  But anybody who's had relatives with health issues or had to deal with aging parents knows how heavy this all feels. My mother has recently had health issues of her own (joint and muscle pain) and she is seeming increasingly confused and forgetful, herself.

Dealing with the move, caring for her and Mario, prepping for Christmas, squeezing in last-minute visits with friends and family before leaving town----well, it's all been too much.  I know many, MANY of you are also now feeling your own version of the "Christmas crunch".

To me, it began to feel as if I had a "1 TON" trapezoid weight resting on my chest.  (You know the ones that appear in the cartoons, at the circus?  Picture that on top of an already small me!) It's affected my breathing and my peace.

So I've been trying to take my own advice.  I told my worship team the other night (as a kind of pre-Christmas eve service pep talk) that the most important thing is for us to stay connected to God and to each other.  No one's Christmas season is as perfect as the idyllic scenes on the Christmas cards----not even the very First Christmas!

But what we are celebrating is the very fact that God is our Savior, our Life Preserver on the stormy seas of life.  Clinging to Him is the best chance we've got at making it!

So, cling to Him, I will.  This morning, I'm feeling a little more hopeful, as if the weight has shifted off of me.  Of course, I'm still in my p.j.'s as I type this, and am fresh from my devotional time with God.  The day is young and there's still plenty of time for me to put that weight back on top of me.  :P  But if it lands on me again, I'm going to make every effort to peer around it and over it to the bigger and more beautiful things around me.

"For unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Savior which is Christ our Lord."

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Prepare Him room

Let every heart prepare Him room. This line from "Joy to the world" has been resonating with me this season. How can my heart do this?  I know far too well how to crowd Him out.  This kind of comes naturally for me, I think!  Honestly, if I don't begin my day with devotional time, I feel like I've, in effect, set Christ outside.  "Sorry, no room at the inn!  Have you tried the stable, just a few yards back?"  :P

It's not that God isn't with me when I am running to and fro.  I know He is always constant and faithful.  He never leaves me.  (Thank You, Jesus! :)  But as I go about my business, my spirit falters.  And part of the problem is exactly that----I'm going about my business, not His.   My heart is off-kilter.  Jesus has been relegated to the sidelines.  

A friend of mine posted this Christmas card that has gone viral.  It's kind of funny at first glance, but there is a truth to it that I find very convicting.  We've all gotten off-kilter, haven't we?  Not only do we fail to prepare Christ room, we often shut others out as well.

Lord Jesus, forgive us and help us, this season especially, to make room for You and those You've called us to love!

Advent

Let every heart prepare Him room.

Little drummer boy

"I have no gift to bring, pa rum pa pum pum."  I have SO much in common with the little drummer boy.  Before the Christ Child, I am humbled.  I come to adore Him, empty-handed, because I know I have nothing to bring that can remotely honor the King.  I don't even have a little drum to bang on.

Sometimes when I say this kind of thing, people think I have poor self-esteem or that I'm in a slump, but neither is the case.  (Well, at least, not right at this moment! ;)  It's just that when I stop and think about God's beautiful character, I'm overwhelmed by His greatness and I suddenly see my smallness.

It's like a picture on an iphone or ipad, that can be magnified with a simple stroke of the finger.  Most days, I'm so preoccupied with myself and my trivial concerns, that I blow myself up, larger than life. But when I see the REAL big picture----that the Heavenly Father sent His One and Only Son to save me, a sinner----I can't help but magnify Him with praise.  

Trust me, I'm not always bubbling over with praise songs floating from my lips.  I wish I were!  I probably should be.  But now and then it hits me, like the scent of cinnamon pine cones at Whole Foods :) and I can't escape the truth of it.  God's extravagant gift of love, wrapped in a baby, was nothing I remotely deserved.  So, the best I can do is say thank You and humbly adore Him.