This year (and really every year) for Christmas, the top of
my wishlist was a hand written letter, followed relatively closely behind by
hugs and boxtops-for-education. I am a
pretty basic kind of girl in my wants and thought my list was easy to
accomplish because it’s wicked cheap and affordable compared to many other
potential gifts. Save your money and
write your words/thoughts instead was what I said.
But this season particularly, it has been abundantly clear
that though my request requires very little money invested, it is still a hard
gift for others to want to give. As one
friend put it in her letter to me this year, “A letter-a letter takes time; a
letter takes thought; a letter takes heart.”
It is much easier to browse a store, find a Joy mug, fill it
with candy and wrap it up than it is to sit down with paper and pen and write a
letter. And I get it, I am a 28 year old
anomaly. I don’t have a husband or kids
rivaling for my attention. I’ve got
loads of quiet hours to myself and can pause Netflix for a quiet moment unlike
my friends who are still searching for the mute button on their own
children. Letter writing is not as much
of an opportunity cost for me as it is for my loved ones so I try my very best
to be understanding. And I am oh so
thankful for those who do take the time to write up personal messages on a
pre-fab Christmas card or take up with paper and pen and write a hand written
note to slip into an envelope to be sent on its way to me. I even have students this year who put
personal messages in their cards to me….these sweet personalized messages mean
so very much to me.
The thought…the intent…the words…the heart…..the sacrifice
of time…It is noted and I am so thankful for it. I am thankful for the other gifts and the
pre-feb cards too. They remind me to be
thankful for the gift of friendships and human connections and to remember to
keep in mind both giving and receiving languages of love. I love receiving letters but I also love
giving them….but maybe those who receive them from me would have been happier
about a practical gift or a monetary contribution. I guess it’s all a balance and finding how to
be love someone else balancing “being myself” with “preferring one another in
love” (Romans 12:10 & Philippians 2:3)
But speaking of sacrifice, this is a time of the year where
Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.
I know you’d think more sacrifice equating with Easter, and it does, but
I think it’s fair to bring it into the Christmas story too. Jesus sacrificed His oneness with God to take
on the flesh of a human and to be “with us” (Matt. 1:23). His life and ministry here on earth took
time, heart and thought as He poured into humans relationally, educationally,
through healing and ultimately through dying, providing the only everlasting cure
to the disease to which we all suffer being sin. His written Word, the Bible took the time of
several, cost many men their lives, and yet it remains a beautiful “letter”, if
you will, giving insight from the past, application for the present and hope
for the future through Jesus Christ, the Lord.
So as Christmas is just around the bend, let us be thankful
for the gifts that may be around the tree and the gifts of family and
friendship shared across the board, but may we not lose sight of the best gift
of all, wrapped not in wrapping paper, but in scraps of cloth and not placed
under a tree, but laid in a feeding trough, so that He could come to this world
to save you and me. Thank God for His
sacrifice for all time through Jesus Christ.
John 3:16-17 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”
Until next time,
Merry Christmas and wishing you a happy new year,
Joy Lynn
