I've been acknowledging the amount of losses this Christmas has had. The amount of losses are not a bad thing, too, even though they might feel draining and holiday-spirit-sucking. Christmas has been a mellow low - that's the only way I know how to describe it. And there's this holiday residue sort of hanging around not really knowing what to do with itself. I remember a couple weeks ago telling myself that I didn't want to eat my weight in cookies or bury myself in the commercialism or materialism this season, which is so easy to do. We subconsciously do this to maybe feel something, or maybe to pretend like things are better than they actually are, or fill a void that is ever-present but we're too easily deceived and susceptible and we'll cling to the easy way out. I told myself I wanted didn't want to fill that void with cookies and gift cards, that I wanted to fill that empty hole of loss with the omnipotent, infinite presence of Jesus. And not just Jesus who I see nailed to the cross, but the Jesus in the manger in the quiet stable surrounded by the stars. The Jesus who was a baby just like me, yet who would save humanity. The Jesus who was given. I think about all the losses again and realize that it is so much easier to not enter in to the mess that it feels. Trying to make the holiday season appear better than it actually is or feel better than it actually is is like avoiding a grieving, angry feeling that should be felt. That is the very spot where Jesus wants to intercede and heal and put right. In that spot. 
I think I have a hard time receiving. There are two sides to gift-giving. A gift is given by a person, but the person who the gift is for has to receive it, too. Otherwise that person never gets the gift, or enjoys it, or enjoys that person who gave it to them, or continues to treasure the relationship they have with the person who gave the gift to them. God chose to give Jesus, but we won't ever enjoy Jesus, who He is, the beautiful relationship there is with Him, without receiving Him here on earth in us. Since Jesus is all in all, through all things, and in Him all things hold together, we get to receive Jesus over and over again, a continual gift in our day-in, day-out, the ultimate gift dying on the cross, conquering our sin and death for eternity. The continual gift of grace. C.S. Lewis puts it well in relation to the choice to receive:
relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done.
In the end, all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace.
May the New Year bring the love and knowledge of Jesus closer, fuller, and only deeper from where we are currently in our sea.
love, cait
