26.2.23

Christmas 2022

It's pretty much March, which means it's practically almost Christmas.  So why not talk about last Christmas?  Last Christmas was a time of great unrest for me.  I was in the midst of a big decision and felt all the days long like I was just holding my breath and waiting to see what was about to happen.  My days are so busy and so full that I feel like I don't even have time to breathe.  I didn't think the decorations would go up.  Somehow they did.  I didn't think I could pull off all the traditions.  Somehow I did.

It's that time of year again . . . the time when we light the candles.  I almost didn't put them out this year.  "Maybe they're over it," I thought.  "Maybe they're tired of doing the same thing advent after advent."  But then Ellie told me I had to.  And . . . she was right.

Mary and Joseph, the manger, the angels' gloria, the shepherds and magi, the Babe in a manger.  It's all so . . . familiar.  There's never been a time in my 40+ years that I didn't know it.  There's also never been a time in all those years of knowing it that I didn't believe it, didn't question it.  Because it IS.  Just like He is the I AM.

And, yet, as familiar as it is . . . the same thing year after year . . . as soon as the first candle is lit . . . it seems so brand new all over again.  I don't think I've ever been filled with such awe, wonder, humility and gratitude as I've experienced this year.

For the first time, I am struck with the simple fact that this is IMPOSSIBLE . . . a baby being born of a virgin . . . impossible!  Yet, I've never questioned this impossibility, never doubted it.  Ever.  In 40+ years never.  I mean, it doesn't even sound impossible at all because it. is. God. And. that's. Who. God. is.  He does the impossible and makes all things possible.

I've never questioned or doubted God-in-the-flesh.  So why would I question or doubt anything else God has promised?  Why would I question or doubt that God is at work in that really hard place, that impossible situation in my life . . . that He is working to make it POSSIBLE?

I took the above picture the second Friday night in December.  It was the only night in the middle of almost four weeks that no one had to be anywhere else.  I told Ellie we needed to leave the candles lit for just awhile longer.

"Blessed is she who BELIEVED, for there will be a fulfillment of those things which were told her from the Lord."  ~Luke 1:45

We got together in May to listen to music for the Christmas program at church.  When I saw this one on the list, I held my breath fast.  (That happens a lot).  It had been awhile.

Circa 1994.  We sang this at our Christmas concerts.  When we started our church tour the following spring, everyone begged us to include it in our concerts.  So we did.  Every time . . . it didn't matter how many times we'd already sun it . . . Joe sang the high part on "He is God's Son," and people would stand to their feet, hands would raise high in the air.

But now . . . it brings me to my knees.  There's a blank page in my Bible between the last verse of the Old Testament and the first verse of the New Testament.  That blank page represents 400 years.

Of silence.

For 400 years, there was no new word from God, no new prophecy.  They were simply waiting on Him to do what He'd already promised to do.  They were waiting on the Messiah to come, the One who would save us from our sins.  I've often thought about how dark that silence must've been.

And then . . . the people who were walking in darkness got to see a great light . . . Jesus, the promised Messiah, was born.  I'd like to think the entire earth exploded with a ball of light once Jesus took His first earthly breath.

Because it had been so dark for so long.  And then . . . light.  I think the only "explosion" into that darkness was the heavenly host of angels that made the grand announcement to a group of lowly shepherds.

The darkest of ages are DONE.  For the Savior of heaven has COME!  In our waiting, we should be watching with great anticipation and expectation, in our waiting and watching, we should be worshipping . . . He is coming again one day.  What hope, what joy!

Speaking of light and candles, we worshipped together as a family again this year at one of our favorite candlelight service.

And then we worshipped at our home church's Christmas Eve candlelight service.  My view was from the piano.

The 2022 holiday season was very different for me, as we didn't have the opportunity to travel to Georgia to spend time with my family.  There was a bit of sadness about that.  But I did host a brunch at my house.  I love me a festive place setting and fresh flowers.

We added a few new ornaments to our tree this year.  Two of them represent a couple of the cities we visited last year during our summer road trip.  And, of course, each of the kids got a new ornament representing something about them from the year.  It's not hard to guess what belongs to who.  And, yes, the tree was deader than dead by the time I took these pictures.

Here are some of my favorite memories:

It's not often that Seth surprises me.  I think the last time was several years ago when he got me a reservation to a cooking class with one of my favorite local chefs.  I'm still not sure how he thought of that.  Nor am I sure how he thought of this.  I cried.  So now he thinks my love language is getting gifts.  I was just very overwhelmed with the gifts that he and my parents gave me.

And then, just like that, it was time to take it all down and put it all away.  But just for a little while.  I have a feeling that when it all comes back out in a few months, it will seem all brand new again.

Read more »

31.12.21

Christmas 2021 | Jesus HAS come.

And just like the rest of this fall, there are very few pictures from our Christmas.  I don't have the first picture of anyone with a gift or opening gifts.  Or the decorations.  But none of those things define Christmas.  Jesus does.

I chose Isaiah 61:1-3 for our card this year.  I feel like there is so much darkness, division, brokenness, grief and sorrow in our world.  And there is!  But in the midst of it all there is GOOD NEWS.

Jesus HAS come.

"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor.  He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the person to those who are bound; to proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified."  ~Isaiah 61:1-3

People need Jesus.  That's all.  People need Jesus.

I'm teaching Matthew's gospel account of Jesus this year at BSF.  When we study God's Word, it's so important that we take the time to consider and understand culture and context.  It adds so much to our understanding of what the Lord is doing, what He is trying to teach us.  Yes, Matthew tells us of the coming, life, ministry, death, burial and resurrection of Jesus.  Matthew's original audience was the Jews, God's chosen people.  He was determined to prove to them that Jesus is, indeed, the promised Messiah, the one the Old Testament prophets foretold, the King.  His book is the bridge between the Old and New Testaments.  That's why he begins with the genealogy of Jesus.  He makes frequent references to the Old Testament and quotes over 60 verses from the Old Testament.  A Jew of Jesus' day would say that He was not the Redeemer-King they were expecting.  So Matthew meets them with the Old Testament, connecting the dots between the Redeemer that was promised and the Redeemer that was provided.

The Old Testament closed without the fulfillment of God's promise of the Messiah.  Four hundred years passed between the last verse of the Old Testament and the first verse in the New Testament.  Four hundred years of silence.  I made a comment in my lecture about Matthew 1 regarding the blank page in my Bible between the Old and New Testament.  Here's what I said:

"Did God change His mind?  Did He fail to remember His promise?  No.  God always keeps His promises. Long silences and periods of delay do not lessen the certainty of God fulfilling His promises.  At just the right time, God broke the silence, and He did it with the cry of a newborn baby being born to a virgin.  Jesus was born during one of the darkest times in Israel's history.  From beginning to end, including the blank page between the Old and New Testament, the Bible is all about Jesus."

I also talked about how during those 400 years . . . that blank page in my Bible . . . yes, God may have been silent, but that does NOT mean He was not at work.  Because He was!  He was working the whole entire time preparing the world for the arrival of His Son, Jesus, the God-Man.

I had no idea the impact of the "blank page."  I had several ladies tell me the following week that they had never noticed the blank page before, that they pulled all the Bibles off the shelves they could find to look and see if there was a blank page between the Old and New Testaments.

Silence.  Darkness.

My favorite lyric from one of my favorite Christmas songs, "When I Think Upon Christmas," is:  Now the darkest of ages are done.  For the Savior of heaven has come.

I have to admit.  It seems dark.  So dark in our world today.  But we live after the cross.  I can't even comprehend what it was like to live on the other side of the cross, before the cross, before the Light had come.  That's a darkness I can't even imagine.

But Jesus HAS come.

I don't have any pictures of our tree with all the sparkly lights and memories hanging on it.  But I do have a picture of the day we picked it out!

I was so bummed last year when our favorite Christmas Eve candlelight service was canceled.  So I was looking forward to it more than usual this year.  We actually attended it on December 23.

And, because you can never light too many candles, we did it all over again on Christmas Eve but at our church.  I had the privilege of playing the piano for this service so the only picture I have is borrowed.

It was such a sweet, sweet service.  And the Lord continued to whisper in my heart . . . I am here.  The Light is here.

Light of the world from the beginning.

The tragedies of time were no match for Your love.

From great heights of glory, You saw my story.

God, You entered in and became one of us.

Light of the world, crown in a manger

born for the cross, to suffer, to save.

High King of Heaven, death is the poorer.

We are the richer by the price that He paid.

Sing hallelujah!

Sing hallelujah!

Sing hallelujah for the things He has done!

Come and adore Him, down down before Him.

Sing hallelujah to the Light of the world.

Somehow I managed to pull off Christmas Eve brunch and Christmas morning homemade cinnamon rolls for my people.  What does it mean when you have a picture of the food but not of your people?

We opened all of the Georgia gifts and our gifts to each other and then spent the rest of Christmas Day with Seth's family.  I have one picture.  One.  And I didn't even take it!  Ashley took it and sent it to me.

This Christmas was very hard because I had so little time to get everything done since I'm working now.  I worked all the way through December 23.  Most all of my Georgia gifts were bought before we went at Thanksgiving, but I didn't get them wrapped in time.  So I ended up dropping a pretty penny at UPS to ship those gifts.  I ran out of time to finish shopping for my children so their stockings were a bit bare this year.  Christmas baking didn't get done.  And I had so little time to just sit and stare at my tree.  I never had an opportunity to just be still.

All of the decorations and lights are down now and packed away until next year.  Regardless of what did or didn't happen, one thing always remains the same.  And it's the most important thing.

Jesus HAS come.

Read more »

30.12.20

Christmas in the Kitchen

I have lots of memories and mainstays from my childhood Christmases.  One of which is my Mama's tins full of pralines, divinity, chocolate covered peanut butter filled ritz, fruitcake, ranch oyster crackers and fudge.  The fudge has always been my favorite.

I love to cook in my kitchen, but I do not love to bake.  Exact measurements take too much time, there's always so much to clean up and it never turns out like the pretty pictures.  We have lots of Christmas traditions around here, but baking hasn't been one of them.  I've always felt like it should be though.  I've always thought it needed to be.  You know, for the kids.  They should have those memories of being in the kitchen with their mom at Christmas time.  So a few years ago my mom gifted me with some fancy tins of my own, and that sealed the deal.  I was going to have to fill them up come December.  

And I did.  Except for last year.  I skipped out on it with the excuse that we were going to be in Georgia for Christmas, and we'd have all the goodies in Mama's tins to enjoy.  We didn't need all of that here because it wouldn't get eaten.  I could've easily skipped out on it again this year, but I decided not to.  So I marked a date on the calendar and made my shopping list.  Besides, with a couple of girls who love to bake, that honestly makes it a bit easier.  They can do all the measuring and mixing, and I can just clean up after them as they go along.  It's a win win!

I'm not a big fan of pecans, but I always loved the turtles my Aunt Gail made at Christmas time, mainly for the chocolate and caramel.  A few years ago I found a recipe for turtles that called for the pecans to be roughly chopped instead of whole.  It's really a fun recipe and an impressive presentation (or at least I think it is) so that's what we use.

Another fairly recent treat is Asian Snack Mix.  Ellie can eat the wasabi peas by the can!

I don't even attempt divinity.  The weather has to be just right with low humidity (which it never is here). Besides my people don't eat them, and neither do I.  Pralines aren't my thing either.  Because pecans.  But they are Seth's favorite so I always make Mama's recipe for him.  The ones we made this day didn't turn out, and I had to scrap them all into the garbage.  Somebody likes to use my candy thermometer for other things so I didn't realize at the time that it no longer registers an accurate temperature.  It's about 7 degrees off, and that made a big difference.  I actually tried again a couple of days later making allowance for those 7 degrees, and the pralines were nearly perfect.

I'm also pretty particular about my fudge.  I don't want nuts in it.  Just chocolate.  And I don't want it grainy.  Just creamy and rich.  I'd been eying a fudge recipe with hazelnuts in it for the past few years and decided to give it a go this year.  I actually like it more than I thought I would.  It's a keeper and will likely show up again next Christmas.

And, of course, look who shows up just in time to lick the bowl!

And, at the end of the day, there's just something about wax paper lined countertops dotted with homemade goodies.

Read more »

29.12.20

Christmas 2020

Christmas 2020.  It was such a good, sweet one.

I woke up early to make homemade cinnamon rolls.  The sleepyheads finally rolled out of bed.  We began the morning by lighting our candles.  All of them.  We gathered at the table and read Luke's account of the birth of Christ and had our final Advent devotion.  We ate cinnamon rolls and leftovers from our Christmas Eve brunch.

And then it was time to open gifts.  The kids wanted to start with their stockings first.  Stockings are always my favorite.

We open all of our gifts on Christmas morning, even the Georgia ones, so there's lots to open.  We pass out all the gifts and then take turns opening each one.

There were lots of smiles Christmas morning.

This is one of my favorite pictures from the morning.  The kids were opening this "together gift" from Pop and Mimi.  I'd asked them for a picture before opening it and told Mason to get down on the floor with the girls since he's so tall.  He then proceeded to declare that he's "getting too old for this."  So I told him that I will definitely remember that for next year.  He told Hannah Kate she needed to move the gift closer to him so he could help open it.  And I told him that wasn't necessary since he's "too old" for gifts now.

I knew there was a basketball in the box.  I did not know there were basketballs in the box.   And they are color coded!

I might have rolled my eyes when Mason opened his and mumbled a comment about an "LSU basketball."  But Mason was quick to inform me that it wasn't an LSU basketball but a Lebron James.  Really?  Then why is it purple and gold?  Mason rolls his eyes.  The Lakers, Mom.  Oh . . .

And . . . every year . . . I look around at the empty boxes, torn wrapping paper, disheveled bows and trash littering the floor . . . and I am reminded that we are blessed.  So very blessed.

You know, Christmas with teenagers is so . . . different . . . than Christmas with children.  It's not necessarily a bad different.  It's just different.  There are no toys to assemble or play with.  There's just . . . this.  (Or maybe this is just my teenager?).

When I was growing up, glitter wasn't allowed . . . you know, the beautiful, shiny, glittery wrapping paper.  Mama always said it made too much of a mess and was impossible to clean up.  But it's so pretty!  I may have been deprived of the glittery wrapping paper growing up, but she more than made up for it this year!

So much so that I had to take my gifts to the back porch to open them!  (Because ain't nobody got time to clean all that up!).  (And, in her defense, she ordered the wrapping paper online and didn't realize how "glittery" it was going to be . . . and, of course, she HAD to use it since she had it.).

After the gifts were opened and the mess cleaned up, we went to Seth's parents' house for the Bayham family Christmas.  I took only one picture the rest of the day.

It was a very merry Christmas, indeed!

Read more »