Merry Christmas

Since about December First, I've been telling myself I just want the Baby Jesus version of Christmas. So much has been going on around here, between work, selling our house and moving, the sadness of so many civil wars around the world, the depressing news about so many police officers around here being shot. . . it just all seems to busy and chaotic. All I want this year is peace. Peace for you, peace for my family.

I pray you all get to experience the Baby Jesus version of Christmas too, regardless of your beliefs. Christ came way before Santa, and when I think of that tiny little infant born in a manger so many years ago, it makes me stop and quiet, feeling humbled and blessed that I have a chance to be somebody good--to show others who Christ is. To try to make this world better. Perhaps it's because of my own two miracles that I feel especially drawn to the Baby this year--I want this world to be so perfect for them. For their innocense to stay strong--for them to never know pain. How elated Mary and Joseph must have been with their miracle. This year I just pause to think of the Baby--how that Baby changes everything, if only we believe.

Liam and Grace get to put Baby Jesus in the manger tonight at our church's Christmas Eve service. Not that they'll remember, but I'll tell them about it. I pray to Jesus that we're able, as parents, to show the peace of Baby Jesus to our children and others through their whole lives. That they'll grow up with the same hope and faith that we have. That someday, they'll be able to tell about and show others the peaceful Baby Jesus.

Merry Christmas.