If you’re thinking “Let’s skip Christmas this year” you’re probably not alone. It takes some fancy footwork and calendar calisthenics to do everything you plan to do done.
Cookies are baked. Parties are thrown. School plays and church plays are applauded. Church services and brunches are attended. Gifts are ripped open. Packaging is recycled. And that’s only half of it. You’re left exhausted and empty during a season of joy and peace.
But then I remember – it’s all optional. We creating for ourselves a classic first world problem. When things that start out being fun and joy-filled start become meaningless and forced, it’s time to take stock.
No one’s forcing me to celebrate Christmas a certain way. No one says I need to have 10,000 traditions for my kids to remember Christmas was special. And if I believe that the Elf on the Shelf showing up inside a cereal box is the only way to create Christmas memories, then I need to think outside the darn cereal box.
I remember a time back in India where Christmas morning I went to church, came home to a nice family lunch and maybe opened one or two gifts. Don’t fall off your chair. Some years I didn’t get a Christmas gift. I didn’t feel robbed in any way. Because Christmas was simply not about gifts. It was about Jesus. Simple. Everything else was an add-on. Just the icing on the cake.
That was our tradition. Our foil Christmas tree was about knee high. It had red roses on it. When it started crumbling, it was replaced by a branch of a Cassurina tree – with cottonwool for snow and balloons as decorations. And we were thrilled with it. We even had gift-wrapped boxes – empty boxes – under the tree because that’s what we had seen in Hollywood movies. Our little minds didn’t quite comprehend that those gazillion boxes under the tree in the movies actually had gifts in them. We thought they were props to make things seem Christmasy!
Haha!
Simpler times.
And yet I’ve conformed to the whole crazy of Christmas in a heartbeat. Cookies and milk for Santa, an Advent calendar with daily activities,
But today I remember that it’s all optional.
Even worshipping the Saviour. That’s optional too. He never forces us to marvel at His birth. To stand astounded by His grace. To wonder at the miracle. He gives us the choice.
I can choose commercialism over Him.
I can choose charity over Him.
I can choose handmade and homespun over Him.
I can even choose simple over Him.
But when I do, I exchanging true joy for something that’s simply a
