December is here!
It is a time to cherish family, express love to friends, make memories, honor traditions and most importantly, it is a time to remember the birth of a tiny baby. The Savior of the world.
I am pretty good at making memories with family and expressing gratitude for my friends and neighbors. I snap lots of pictures to preserve special moments and we do traditional things like making gingerbread houses and going to see the lights at Temple Square.
Yep, I do ok in those areas.
What I am not so great at is the most important part of the season, remembering the Savior.
Many Christmas nights I have felt a little twinge of disappointment in myself. I look around at all the gifts, the scraps of wrapping paper, remnants of a feast devoured earlier and I wonder....
what did I give Him?
Oh, we participate in Sub for Santa and other charitable causes and those things are good. But it seems that there should be something more, something deeper.
This Christmas I determined to do better. A couple of weeks ago I called a family meeting. I told everyone to come with six ideas for acts of service.
We gathered together and shared our ideas. We compiled a list and Mark made a calendar entitled 25 Days of Service. Some ideas are simple and don't cost anything like:
Say hi and smile all day. Look for kids who need a friend at recess.
Write thank you notes to primary teachers.
Other things on our list include buy pet supplies and deliver them to the Humane Society, take grandparents out to breakfast read and study about the life of Jesus.
My favorite is "Love at Home Mondays". We each take a person in the family to do little acts of kindness for all day. We rotate each week. Last week flowers were given, beds were secretly made, love notes were posted around the house.
We also have a top secret project that we are working on to be delivered Christmas Eve.
We started on December 1 and now we are a week in. It has been a sweet experience. While none of our ideas are grand or elaborate, small efforts have turned into a big dose of Christmas spirit. We find ourselves remembering Him more and thinking about ourselves less.
I am so very grateful for a child born in the humblest of circumstances. I can never thank him enough for His example, His life, His love. I want to know Him better. I want to do better.
If you have additional ideas that help put the Christ in Christmas, please share.
May this season be full of love, for Him.
4 comments:
It the past it was a tradition for Russell and me to go to the Forgotten Carols by Michael McLean. The music is so wonderful and we would always leave there so uplifted. Last year they came out with the performance on DVD. Now we will watch it at home each year. If you are not familiar with the play, he takes the perspective of those in the Christmas story that may have been overlooked. How did the inn keeper feel after he found out he turned the Savior away? How did Joseph feel with the awesome responsibility he was given? He has written songs about this and put it into a play format. IT is a must see and you have to have the CD of the music. You are welcome to borrow it!
I love this idea! I wish you would have shared it sooner :) Maybe we will start a 12 days of Christmas service project, and next year we will do 25. Thanks for sharing! I love your blog by the way.
Terry
I really liked reading your breakdown for HOW you were going to accomplish more service to Him during the Christmas season. Thank you, I love ideas to better the Christmas season and to do with my family too.
Loved all your ideas. We, too, are trying to be more serviceable, but I really like how concrete your day-to-day actions are.....I'll have to remember that for next year. Thanks for sharing!
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