Well, I did it this weekend; I hung up our Christmas Lights.  I usually dread this chore.  It seems that the chosen day is almost always windy and cold and nasty, and I am usually exhausted from the busyness of the season.  ‘This is how it’s all going to end, man falls to death outside of home, decorating garage.’  Not exactly a hero’s end to great life!

But this year was different.  God has been drawing me to a dependency on him, and with that, an intimacy.  And so as I stood on that top wrung of my aluminum step ladder (you know, the one that they say never to stand on), reaching high overhead, a sense came that this year, I was not doing this for the family, or to avoid being labeled as scrooge, or even to make a statement of the importance of the holiday.  This year I was decorating for a friend.  This year I was celebrating my brother, the King.

We all hear that reminder, ‘Jesus is the Reason for the Season.’  And yet, it seems that though we know that in our heads, we forget it in our hearts; and so is it any wonder that our holidays are less than holy?  Proverbs tells us that it is our hearts that are the wellspring of life … not our heads.  It is the status of the heart that determines the ‘life’ that we are experiencing.

This weekend, if for only a hour, I think that I experienced some of what that life was to be.  Celebrating my King, my Savior.  Not living in obligation, but in anticipation.  This weekend, on that ladder, he was the reason. 

I want more of that.  And so, I must be purposeful in the guarding, or the care, of my heart; taking time for it to hear from God, to be healed, and to be restored.  It’s not an accessory, something that I do for extra credit, it is crucial to this life in Christ.

And maybe, just maybe, taking down the lights and cleaning up the party won’t be so bad either.  We’ll see.

To the King,

David