Christmas only comes but once a year, but it greatly impacts our lives in many ways. I know it is a great boost to our economy because some businesses receive as much as one-third of their yearly receipts during the month of December, We also have made it into a time of family tradition and many times, it may be the only time during the year we actually see or even communicate with our family members. In our nation, we have come to idealize Christmas; it has become an almost magical time when we find that at sometime in our past, there was most likely was a “perfect” Christmas.

By a “perfect” Christmas, I mean a time in which we have forgotten most, if not all, of the negatives that may have occurred at that time and find ourselves remembering something that is not really very accurate, but it fits our paradigm of the “ideal Christmas”. The problem with the creation of this idyllic Christmas is that we then compare our future and present Christmas seasons unfairly to this ideal Christmas that never really happened. Guess what? Our present season never is able to measure up! We feel let down and sometimes even depressed because we can never retrieve that idyllic dream of Christmas in that way again.

So what is the answer to this current dreadful Christmas season where we find ourselves at war, seeming helpless to fight an unseen terror that threatens to steal all that we hold dear in this country? We need understanding about what Christmas really means to us now in our present circumstance.  First, to understand that Christmas is not about the gifts, but rather about The Gift. In my current circumstance, it is The Gift that I truly need. My life is a testimony to The Gift and without it, Christmas would have no meaning to me at all. Consider this, that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son so that you and I may have the opportunity to have a deep and abiding relationship with Him now and forevermore.

And so with the hope He provides, we have the very real possibility of having a thankful and blessed Christmas season. Could it even be that there is the possibility of this Christmas being the best Christmas ever? Christmas is first what He made it to be, and now, what will you make it to be? Yes, it is a season of giving, but also it is a season of receiving. Will you receive The Gift personally and all of the love, acceptance, joy, and peace that accompanies His Gift? Then may it not stop with you…may you pass it on.