In early November, I challenged myself to tackle some of my most stressful and time-consuming Christmas tasks by Thanksgiving in a desperate attempt to savor and fully experience Advent both personally and with my kids. The past several years, I have stressed my way through the holidays that I once loved dearly, and I really want this year to be different. I want to actually finish the Advent devotionals that I start and to bake and make crafts with Saylor and to help Lydia understand the Christmas story for the first time. I want to hear from God this Advent and reflect daily on what Christmas really means, so that when the 25^th comes, I will fully appreciate what I am celebrating. As part of my challenge, I hope to journal through Advent in an attempt to keep myself accountable, capture what God reveals, and use this blog that I never find time to write in! Even if no one else reads these journals, I will appreciate the outlet for reflection, as writing always helps me process life a little more fully.

December 1. Advent is here. The devotionals and other activities I have carefully been selecting for weeks start today. Yet when I woke up, the excitement I expected felt tainted by apprehension. Why? I have mostly succeeded in my mission to ease the stress of Christmas preparations. Lots of gifts are safely tucked away in their hiding places. Most of my cards have been delivered or at least mailed. The tree is decorated and fortified with an extra large baby gate in hopes of keeping the ornaments ON it. Yet, I found myself procrastinating the start of the festivities this morning—after breakfast, after coffee, after the baby’s nap—until I finally just dove in. Everything went just fine, so what was my problem?

I think God is trying to show me something about myself. My sometimes perfectionist self may need to get out of the way if I want Christmas to be what it is truly about. Take His first point for illustration—Christmas cards. Yes, I mailed them last Wednesday. And on Saturday I found, not one, but THREE typos in our family letter that goes to friends we don’t see often. Now, this may seem insignificant to most people, but it was a serious blow to my former-English-teacher pride. How could I have mailed over a hundred copies of something written, typed, and edited by me that contained not one but TWO missing commas and a missing word! A whole word!?! Now, granted it was a small word (“a”), but still. I thought of sending an addendum, printing a retraction, claiming that my letter was stolen by aliens or small children and mailed without my knowledge. But alas, I just twitched a few times and convinced myself to get over it. Because I realized that I would much rather have my imperfect letter mailed and delivered than to still have that task hanging over my head. Sometimes the little, truly insignificant details can be sacrificed for the ultimate goal.

Christmas is ripe with opportunities to get distracted by the details and paralyzed by perfection. We spend so much time searching for the perfect gift, designing an eye-catching card, scouring recipes for the one that will be the talk of the cookie swap, or shopping for the outfit that will make our little angel stand out among the swarms of children in the Christmas Eve choir. Okay, so I have never been to a cookie swap, and my angel was always the one pulling her dress up over her head, but the point is that my first lesson this Advent season is that sometimes God wants me to sacrifice perfection in preparation for completion. My work can truly be neverending, or I can stop and say it is good enough, and now I will spend time with my family or quiet myself before God and really listen to Him. In our culture today, this is especially difficult. The Internet taunts us with an endless supply of ideas, recipes, and gift options. We could truly never stop seeking, planning, and preparing for the perfect Christmas. But if we do that, we will surely fall short because most of what creates a truly meaningful Christmas comes not from physical preparations but from heart preparations, and those cannot be found on Amazon or Pinterest, or Allrecipes.com but in time in God’s Word and in prayer and through savoring the season with family and friends.

Lord, limit me to enough preparations to give my family a special, memorable time this Christmas, but let me be okay with imperfections, so I can enjoy this Advent season with my family and sit in Your Presence and learn from You. In Your name I pray, Amen.

“Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:38-42, ESV)

(Saturday night)                                   (Monday morning)