Christmas

Christmas is by far my favorite time of year. As a child growing up, it mean getting presents, and seeing all the pretty decorations, and listening to the music around the house. Christmas was a happy time of year, even if things hadn't been going to great. Now, as a grown up, I still love Christmas, but for different reasons. Instead of looking forward to getting gifts(which I do like, don't get me wrong :P) I like giving them even better. Knowing that I put thought into a gift for someone, and that it will make them happy to get it, makes me happy. This is the time of year that we celebrate Christ's birth, His willingness to give up everything He had in Heaven, so become a human child, to experience everything that we experience just so that in the end He could die, is such a wonderful act of love, I can't even begin to fathom it. I think is the real reason behind my love for Christmas. I've always been a bit of a hopeless romantic, and to look at Christ's love for us is the best kind of love to get all warm and fuzzy over.

Even more than the gift giving, is the songs. The songs make Christmas what it is, it is the only time of year that we listen to this kind of music, and it all focuses on family, and love, and, in the case of the Carols, Christ's birth. How often, though, do we sing along with the songs, and forget what they're saying? I know that some of my favorites include Angels We Have Heard on High, and Hark the Herald Angels Sing. I know them so well that sometimes they just pop into my head. I even start humming them, but I almost never stop to think about what the words are saying.

Hark the Herald Angels Sing, for example. The first few lines say "Hark, the Herald Angels sing, glory to the newborn king, peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled." God and sinners reconciled, all because this little newborn King came down to earth to be born in a manger. It blows my mind. The implications of Christ's act are beyond my understanding, honestly. He loves us, so He came to die for us. It sounds so simple, and yet He is GOD, He gave up EVERYTHING. Just so that we could live forever with Him, us, the people who screwed it up to begin with. His love is so powerful, so all encompassing, it's hard to see why He loves us so much, and yet He does. These songs contain such a powerful message, and yet in this day and age, they get glossed over, pushed aside while the radio's play the more enjoyable, "fun" Christmas music. Or almost worse than that, the songs get sung without any acknowledgment of what they are saying.