The Gift of a Christmas Verse
I hope you enjoyed yesterday’s post as I shared our family tradition of The Grab Bag. If you missed it, scroll back and take a look. As promised, today I am going to share another family tradition that helps us focus on the true meaning...
The Grab Bag–A Fun Idea for Christmas
In many ways, Christmas is a time that we enjoy many family traditions as we celebrate the birth of Christ. Many families have special things that they do each year in preparation or celebration. For most of us, the Christmas season is not complete without trimming the tree, making some yummy treats, and searching for that special present for a loved one. Letter’s to Santa, Christmas PJ’s, an ornament to commemorate the year, reading the Christmas story, helping someone in need, attending Christmas Eve service, Christmas stockings, the Christmas menu…these are some of the variety of traditions that find their way into our celebration of God’s greatest gift to mankind.
I love Christmas traditions, both playful and sacred. I have countless wonderful memories neatly wrapped around the traditional ways that my family celebrates the birth of Christ. Over the next two days I want to share with you two traditions that we enjoy in our family–one that brings lots of laughs and one that brings a sweet touch of scripture into our family time.
Let’s start with the fun one–mainly because if you want to do this with your family, you may need to take yet another trip to the store–groan groan. Yes, I know it would have been helpful if I had posted this a few weeks ago, but I just didn’t think about it. So be it.
Each year on Christmas Eve we enjoy attending church and having a quiet time enjoying the ambiance of reading the Christmas story around the Christmas tree. After something yummy to eat and a little hot cocoa, we stir things up a little with a game we call The Grab Bag.
Inside a large bag are an odd assortment of practical and silly gifts. Once the giftys are collected, I tie yarn or string around them, place them in a bag that you can’t see through, and wa-lah…we are ready for some fun!
The Grab Bag in action.
The Grab Bag is passed around until the bag is empty ( I usually plan for 3 times around). Take your time and enjoy the frivolity that comes with each persons reaction to their prize.
Some treasures I gather from around the house…like a roll of toilet paper or fun photo from the year. Others I borrow from my stocking stuffer stash…maybe a bottle of mouth wash (used could be an interesting twist..) or a pair of ladies stockings. Then there are the dollar store items…things like a tacky figurine, a birthday party favor, a kid’s toy, a mug, a pack of post-it-notes, a candy bar…you get the idea.
Everyone can enjoy a little spa treatment.
Of course, there is often a lot of bartering and trading that goes on as folks try to redistribute gifts to the person that might best use the item… For instance, this gift only fit one person in the family…
Don’t forget the dog! They like the Grab Bag too!
The best part of The Grab Bag includes the gag gifts and inside joke gifts that are mixed in. Here again, the dollar store is your friend. Fake tattoos, grungy Halloween teeth, colorful wigs, those silly headbands with Christmas stuff springing out the top, Rudolph’s nose, a bag of coal…are a few of the funnies that have shown up in our grab bag over the years.
Need a nose ball roller? Japanese 100 yen stores had some unusual items…
One year there was one pink fuzzy child’s slipper that was pulled out of the back by our ten year old son. He loved that! Everyone always gets a chuckle when an adult pulls out a kid thing or a kid recieves an adult thing. When my daughter was six, she pulled out a queen-sized pair of nylons in a Leggs egg (remember those?). She laughed so hard when she saw those and proceeded to unwrap them and try to put them on over her cute little Christmas PJs. Last year, I found a santa suit at the 100 yen store…
What would you like for Christmas, Daddy?
Then there are the inside jokes. One year that we were with my brother on Christmas Eve, I thought of something we used to laugh about growing up. When we were teenagers we used to have this running joke about my mom’s extra freezer in the basement. We would reach in and see who could pull out the oldest item. You see, my mom was very organized and labeled everything…such as cupcakes from Jenny Jone’s birthday, June 1982. You never knew what kind of pre-historic treasure you might find lurking in the back corner of the bottom shelf. Anyway, that year, I pulled a pack of porkchops from Mom’s freezer, wrapped them in foil and wrote, “Porkchops, 1975” on the foil. Luck of the draw was truly with me on this one when my brother just happened to be the one to pull out the chops! At first, he had no idea what incredible treasure he had received. I think the foil threw him off. As soon as he figured out the joke, he laughed harder than I have ever seen him laugh. It is probably one of the few times in my life I have ever pulled one over on him. Let me tell you, it felt good!
Just in case her cell phone breaks…
As you can see, there is lots of room for fun and creativity with The Grab Bag. I hope you will enjoy trying this with your family this year. If you do, let me know how it goes! We can all store up a few grab bag ideas for next year. By the way, the after Christmas sales is a great time to stock up Grab Bag items for next year.
Why Moving is More Than Unpacking: The Sacrifice of Accepting Change
No move is complete without a little…actually A LOT… of unpacking. The moving truck arrives and the boxes start coming off.
The inventory is checked…
The unpacking begins!
And life goes on as change moves in.
Yours may not be a military family, but embracing change is a lesson for all–it’s a part of every family and every life, regardless of where we live or what we do.
Accepting change is my offering to God:
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering (Romans 12:1, The Message).
…even if He chooses to pack my life up on a moving truck and ship our family 4000 miles across the globe.
There’s a part of me that wants to keep snatching up some aspect of my life off of the altar of sacrifice. There are areas in my life I still want to control. I think that’s why moving is challenging—I have to wait in faith as God enables me to feel at home, find a church, make friends, help kids get connected, and so on. Too often, I wait in anxious unease, as I get settled in a new place.
This is the unease of one who has jumped off of the altar, struggling to rest and trust in the midst of change.
Instead changing things in one or two areas of my life, all of a sudden change becomes a constant of my everyday life, as the outward trappings of life are whisked away by the moving truck. On the other end, our household goods show up, but the process of moving into a new experience in a new place takes much longer than arranging the furniture, painting a room, or hanging the pictures.
When I get settled in our new house, I make many of the decisions…I have the power of choice…and I like that kind of control!
Other aspects of getting settled in a new place take time and God’s providing grace.
They don’t carry the essentials of life at Walmart and you won’t find them in any mall, no matter how many stores it has. Contentment, peace, relationship, connection, faith, and trust can’t be packaged and they won’t arrive in the mail. The all-important, intangible components of life are gifts that only God can provide.
The all-important, intangible components of life are gifts that only God can provide.
When I truly place my life before God as an offering, available for His plans, purpose, and timing, I can let go of my desire to get everything worked out the way I want it as fast as possible. When I decide to wait with faith and embrace what He has for me here, I open the doors of resistance and truly lay myself down.
In our last move, I sensed that God spoke to my anxious thoughts: Submit to change. He was telling me to stay on the altar and let Him do something new in my life. We cannot fully experience the benefits of change without first letting go of what has been left behind.
Whether or not I submit to and embrace the changes God has brought into my life, they are here. Embracing what God plan, cooperating with faith and grace, is the obedience of remaining on the altar.
Through the sacrifice of resistance and control, I place myself in a position that frees God to do His greatest work in me, transforming me from the inside out–address change and all!
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