It’s Christmas Time…Again

It’s time to celebrate another Christmas; how we celebrate Christmas will determine if we will emerge after the holiday refreshed and happy, or overwhelmed and angry. Too often we overspend, overdo, and overindulge teens, and children. Although our intentions are good, we suffer the same outcome each year, unhappy children too overspent on gifts, and feel let down. It seems that no matter what some teens and children are given they are still unhappy with their gifts.

One of, the absolute best Christmases, I had was when my family decided that we would buy each other one Christmas gift that cost ten dollars or less. I thought my teenage daughter would have a big problem with that, but to my surprise, she was the leader in finding gifts for ten dollars. It was a fun and good experience. We looked at things for gifts that we would have never considered before. The pressure was off to out-perform last year’s Christmas. Since we were limited in the cost, it made shopping a whole lot easier, and a lot more fun.

With spending money as a secondary goal, we were able to focus on the primary goal, truly giving to each other. That is, we gave the gift of time to each other and to those around us. We were able to focus on sharing recipes, cooking together, having discussions, attending church services, and helping others who needed our help. Taking our eyes off ourselves, and what we were going to get, gave us the freedom to focus on what Christ would want us to focus on, building our relationship with each other and helping those who need help.