Celebrating Christmas

With only six days to go before we celebrate Christmas, it would be a crime not to be in a jolly good mood! The days are filled with festive cheer and suddenly everything around us seems much brighter. Shops, offices and homes are decked out in festive decorations.

Our shopping lists are long and feverish as bills and stresses are pushed to the back of our heads. If your company has had a good year and if you’ve been a performer, you are most likely looking forward to that bonus pay cheque that is sure to be in your bank accounts before the month ends.

When I was younger, Christmas meant four things; carols, presents, family get-togethers and lots of good food but, as with most children, presents were more significant than the rest. We always woke up on Christmas morning filled with anticipation on what the gift-wrapped boxes under the tree held in store for us and couldn’t help but poke and prod at them when the adults were not looking, in an attempt to guess what our presents were.

That, coupled with the fact that each Christmas meant having a wonderful luncheon with my cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents, made the 25th of December the most exciting day of the year for me.

Now that I am older, I’m not ashamed to reveal that I still look forward to Christmas Day with that wide-eyed, child-like excitement, even though I do not look forward to the material presents anymore. For me, celebrating the gift of loved ones and family and spending time with them, singing along to Christmas carols, reflecting on the significance of Christ’s birth, giving of myself and enjoying the happiest day of the year make Christmas complete. This year, I would like to add one more thing to that list; brighten someone’s life and ease their load so that they too have a reason to smile.

What does Christmas mean to you?  How do you celebrate? As you count down to and plan for Saturday, I wish you a merry Christmas and God’s blessings upon your life!

The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.  

Burton Hillis

Christmas is most truly Christmas when we celebrate it by giving the light of love to those who need it most. 

 Ruth Carter Stapleton

 

The joy of brightening other lives, bearing others’ burdens, easing other’s loads and supplanting empty hearts and lives with generous gifts becomes for us the magic of Christmas.

 W. C. Jones