The Wonder of Christmas

   This is the time of year when I take a deep sigh and wonder how Christmas got to be such a mess.

   We have barely pushed ourselves away from the Thanksgiving table when, like a starter’s pistol, we are instructed to buy!

   The demands pile up, the expectations become more impossible, and we wonder whose idea this was in the first place.

   We wonder how we will ever finish everything we have to do.

   Wonder is a big part of Christmas, the wrong kind of wonder.

   Instead, I propose a focus on renewed wonder this year.  The wonder of the love of God.  The wonder of the Word made flesh.  The wonder of the second chances, of unearned grace, of God’s meeting our sin with the cross.

   Why?  And why for me?  This is the wonder of Christmas!