I’ve already confessed to my love of Christmas music, so naturally I’m also a fan of Christmas movies.  I love them all; from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to the Muppet Christmas Carol with Michael Caine.  My absolute favorite though is “A Charlie Brown Christmas”.  Nothing is as poignant as Linus\’speech about Christmas.  When Charlie Brown becomes so frustrated with his friends regarding their preoccupation with material trappings, and yells out “Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?”  Linus is quick to respond and takes center stage and quotes scripture from Luke 2:8.  When he’s finished quoting scripture, he tells Charlie Brown “That’s what Christmas is all about…” How fitting that a child should break it down in the most simplest of terms why we celebrate Christmas. If you have time this holiday season, watch “A Charlie Brown Christmas”, it’s touching message is timeless.

Dictionary.com defines gratitude as “the quality or feeling of being grateful or thankful”. If you watch late night television, you may have seen Jimmy Kimmel\’s recent challenge to parents to give their kids one bad gift and allow them to open it up prior to Christmas and send the video of their reaction to YouTube.

 
I saw the video and the reactions of the children ranged from sweet to nasty attitudes. It made me think though about the expectations we have regarding gifts and how we as adults show our gratitude. So often due to the excess of material things in our lives, we don’t place as much importance in the smaller gifts, whether they’re homemade or just purchased on a budget. Kids take their cue from us, and if we’re not valuing the time and effort it took someone to make, purchase, or select a gift for us, why should our children. Take the time out and reiterate to our children how important it is to be thankful for all we already have and to be sincere in their gratitude for any gift whatever the size or cost.

I love Christmas music.  If I could I would play it throughout the year, but since that would drive my husband insane, I have to limit my Christmas music to November through December.  Anyways, driving in our car, I always have the radio on an all Christmas station and a song that’s constantly played is \”Do They Know It\’s Christmas\” by Band Aid. Now I know I’m dating myself, but I remember when that song first played on the radio.  I was a young teenager and the idea of a song actually helping out those across the world who were suffering from hunger was a powerful thought.

 Now 27 years later, hunger and lack of medical attention isn’t just a problem in Africa but across the world.  In the United States alone, the U.S. Census Bureau reports there are 43.6 million Americans living at the poverty level or below. Please take a moment out of your day to reflect on what you can do to help your fellow man.  There are so many organizations which offer aid; perhaps one of their missions calls to you.  Let’s try to lend a hand to those in need because the problem will continue to grow unless more of us offer our help.

Yesterday my family and I went to a local convalescent hospital to visit the sick and shut-in. Along with other families we sang Christmas carols and passed out bags of holiday cookies. Looking into the audience it reminded me how often we forget the needs of the elderly and infirm. As the children handed the bags of cookies out, so much joy was brought to the lives of these individuals with just their presence. I was asked over and over again by the patients to make sure that children came by so that they could talk to them as it had been so long since they had interacted with young children. All it took to bring these individuals so much happiness was an hour of our time. I know that it affected our family so much that we are making a greater commitment to visit these individuals on a more regular basis. Can you spare an hour of your time to visit those in nursing and convalescent homes so that they don’t feel forgotten?

As families prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow, department stores are gearing up for Black Friday.  With the country still in a recession, stores are trying to entice customers to get in line early so that they can take advantage of special “door buster” sale items.  With doors to some stores opening at midnight on Thursday, individuals will be lining up early Thursday afternoon to be the first ones in the door.

 What ever happened to Thanksgiving revolving around family and counting our blessings?  It seems our society has become so fixated on having the latest and greatest that we’ve forgotten the reason for Thanksgiving.  Please don’t buy into the hype, instead stay home, enjoy this time with your family and count all the blessings that you and your family have no matter how small they are.

I ran across an interesting article giving 4 good reasons why the bible should not be read literally. The article is here.

If you’ve been visiting our blog, you may have noticed some technical difficulties this past weekend.  We apologize, but that is the risk with being on the web.  We are pleased that our blog is back up and running…although the site style needs to be updated.  Please continue to come back and read all of our posts.  Blessings to you all.