The Christmas Thief!

TWENTY YEARS AGO TODAY

my dad died.

Since he was in his nineties,

his death was not unexpected.

His death set in motion a chain of events

that shook our family to the core that Christmas,

and tested the realness of our faith in God.

The cataclysmic occurrence was an automobile accident

that took place on the way to the funeral home two days later,

taking the lives of three of my siblings,

and permanently affecting the health of a sister-in-law and a nephew.

For those of you that have heard our story or read it in

"Joy in the Mourning",

I won't re-tell the account.

(You can download it FREE to your Kindle or purchase a hard copy by clicking on the link above.)

Instead, I would like to share with you

where I am emotionally and spiritually now that it is

TWO DECADES LATER!

Honesty and being real have always been important to me,

so I'm not going to lie and say it has been easy!

For some strange reason, 

this Christmas, TWENTY YEARS LATER, has been the toughest one yet!

I feel like I've been fighting depression

 and been dwelling again too much on that horrific night.

I tried to analyze why this was so,

and came up with these conclusions.

One was the death of my brother-in-law about a month ago.

Like the timing of my father's death,  he also was in his nineties.

We knew that we couldn't have him here forever,

yet his death affected me greatly,

and I hurt deeply for his immediate family.

(You can read about his extraordinary Scrabble playing HERE!)

Two more funerals followed closely on the heels of my brother-in-law,

and I began learning something new about myself.

I knew that God had gifted me with the attribute of mercy,

but instead of just using it to bring comfort to others as described in 2 Corinthians 1:4,

I was allowing it to grow into an unhealthy empathy.

I began realizing that in this unhealthy emotional state,

such overwhelming grief seized me to the point that I often felt losses more deeply

than the persons who were directly affected!

NOT GOOD!
I had become my own worst ENEMY!

Okay,

that was confession number ONE about how I began losing my JOY this Christmas!

Now on to the SECOND confession!

I let anger creep in over the commercialization of Christmas!

What really got me upset

 was when I couldn't find an outdoor Nativity set for sale in our town.

Although I was able to purchase one on-line,

I continued to seethe inwardly that our country,

and our town in particular, had gotten to this place.

In protest, I refused to put up my usual Christmas lights and decorations,

and I placed a Nativity set in the corner where I usually put up my tree.

Then today it hit me.

I was allowing my over-zealous grief for others,

and my anger for our loss of Christ-consciousness at Christmas,

to steal the JOY, beauty and wonder of Christmas!

The thief that allowed this to happen was ME!

In nursing we learned that defining the problem was half of solving the problem.

I'm still working on the solution...

Today I did go buy a small Christmas tree to put beside the Nativity Scene.

Tomorrow I plan on going Christmas shopping with my recently widowed sister.

I plan on enjoying the day with her as I remind myself that part of the key to JOY

this Christmas Season is to be thankful for what we have left

instead of fretting and mourning over what we have lost.

As Joyce Meyers says, "The Battle is in our Minds"!

I choose to bring my thoughts into line 

with what the prophet Jeremiah says in the Scriptures:

"I still dare to hope..."

Lamentations 3:21

Yes,
God is faithful.
His mercies are new every morning!

And this is going to be a good Christmas!

Thanks for your visit!

To see my Christmas Rock and the Nativity Set mentioned above,

click HERE!