A real Christmas
Well, Christmas is almost over. We celebrate with my dad and step-mom tomorrow. Then Christmas 2009 will be one for the books. But what kind of book would it be in? It won't be in the book about picture-perfect Christmases or the one about tragic Christmases. It won't be in the one of dysfunctional family Christmases or the one about idyllic Christmases full of great conversations. It was Christmas, it was nice....
I got some good gifts. My favorite was a scarf that my mom bought me that wasn't on my list. I didn't really give people many ideas for gifts...and I got almost everything I asked for. And I even got some money that I can give to Advent Conspiracy (late). I think I only have one thing I need to return.
My cooking had its highs and lows this year. The two types of treats I made did not turn out like I wanted. And I feel like I really didn't contribute to our extended family stuff enough. They don't ask much...but I hope that isn't because they don't really expect much from me. My dinner for our special little family went really well...even the peppery gravy that Alex liked.
But as I sat with Roger on the couch last night and cried--Cried about my own insecurities and struggles--I looked at my tree. And my tree defined this Christmas:
it's real
It's not fake...it's not "perfect" like people who like fake trees tend to think they are.(don't get me started!) It's got a few holes, it's not completely even, it wasn't grown at a tree farm where it was carefully tended by people....it's just right out of the forest real.
I had a real Christmas.
posted by Mellifluous @ 12/26/2009 05:52:00 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
A Real Christmas for a Real life.
I think we're brought up too much looking for "the arrival" of "LIFE"- a time when everything will be complete, and fulfilled, and satisfying, and ready to conquer everything... I've wasted too much time and energy and effort and mental strength looking for, waiting for, agonizing over why I don't have, that "arrival" of "LIFE".
I am IN "life" right now- I always have been- and it isn't ever going to get any "easier", or "better", or more "perfect". It already IS all those things in the completeness of God's provision for our lives in this present moment. My life now, right now, is as complete, as fulfilled, as perfect, as ready to conquer everything as God needs it to be for me right NOW.
And I need to focus more on living for God and through God and in God's provision of the NOW- the REAL- life that He has given me in His wisdom and mercy and less on looking for the 'more' that I've been led to believe I should have/get/be/do/accomplish in my life.
My life is real. My ups and downs are part of the real. The holes and "imperfect" decor are real. The pain and the joy are real. And the promises are Real. Promises that tell me I've already conquered everything, because I've got the most Real thing in the universe speaking for me, through me, and in me.
It's just so easy to forget that. So hard to understand even in the littlest way what TRUE 'real' is- in this world of perfectly constructed imagery of what we should be and have.
Here's to a new year, my dearest friend, and to the daily new chances we're given to live in the Real with God.
I love you. Thank you for being the you God created.
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