It’s 5:45 am… I throw back the covers and my eyes pop open. It’s go time.
I swing my feet over the side of the bed. Oh, that floor is cold! I creep out of bed, down the hall, and take a deep breath. The moment of truth…
There, in the gentle glow of Christmas lights are piles of presents. Santa showed up and he did not disappoint. I grab the nearest gift with my name on it and violently shake it. Nothing. Dang. It’s probably clothes. Socks. Maybe even underwear. Sigh.
Yes, I have grown up and matured over the lasts couple of decades. I still love receiving the gifts, but now I love the family time even more… Especially since I am married to a soldier. That’s a whole new level of not taking that time for granted!
God designed my heart to give. I love giving presents and showering people with love, sometimes in the form of “stuff.” Each year at Christmas, I would go all out thinking, marinating, pondering strategerizing, and planning what I deemed were “perfect gifts.”
Last year for Christmas, my beloved suggested that we do something different and forego the hoopla of dropping wads of cash and buying presents. He suggested we give something perhaps more thoughtful like donating our money to a good cause.
I flat out told him NO. Absolutely not. Negative. Nada. So we went with the “traditional” gift giving. It was great.
That was last year. Apparently God wanted to do a little bit of work on my heart… And I suggested we do Christmas differently this year.
So we did. And, it was also great, just like last year, only in a different way. This week’s posts are all about giving… Not giving stuff, but rather giving a piece of our heart for Jesus. For the next several days, I will share with you the heart gifts that Brandon and I gave to our family.
The gifts weren’t much, but they were ones that will hopefully keep on giving… Just like that gift that God gave us when he sent His son to die on the cross.
Just because Christmas has passed for another year, doesn’t mean our Jesus heart of giving has to stop… Christ-mas is one day… But we can celebrate Christ-more all year long.
Never stop giving,
SGK
“But since you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in the love we have kindled in you —see that you also excel in this grace of giving.” 2 Corinthians 8:7
