Day 43 of 4 more years: Cedar Fever
Christmas _______. Today is "fill in the blank day." I noticed a post earlier this week where you were encouraged to tell what Christmas means to you and why. I think that is a great exercise to do and fun to do with the children and grandchildren. So today my blank would not be very encouraging or great. It is not my best day. I did turn over and get some extra sleep this morning, because I have a Christmas visitor. A memory of my childhood. I have Christmas "cedar fever!" And it is awful any time of the year, but the mystery of my youth was why I always got sick (bronchitis, tonsillitis, any other "itis" I could catch) and at Christmas. Never convenient, never fun, but somehow the timing was always the same.
Here is the Christmas memory: I may have mentioned it earlier, but my great-grandmother lived in a big old house about a 100 yards from my house. And boy, did she love Christmas! And one of the best memories was the big, gigantic, amazing Christmas tree put in her living room. Rather, dragged, pushed and shoved in there. My older cousins would venture out on their mission to find the perfect tree early in the day. I was never invited, too little and a pest I am sure. But finally, the word would come, "They are back, and it is the biggest one ever!" We would always doubt it could be squeezed in, sometimes it had to be chopped off more, but eventually the big old cedar tree was up, with the top smashed over… and the decorating began. The women were always cooking, so it was up to the kids and the uncles, dads and grandpas. Decorations were homemade and old, with raggedy garland, and faded glass balls. It didn't matter. It was beautiful, it was magical and it was CEDAR!
That was not the problem cedar tree, however. The bad guy was in our house up the road. That cedar tree had been cut weeks earlier, and by this time in December, it was drying out. It was flaking off, shedding like crazy and giving off years of pollen into our house, right around the corner from where I slept. Just thinking of that tree makes my eyes water. Yes, today, you can see the pollen on the cedar hillsides in central Texas, and I am better off up here, where the cedars are more "scarce." But the worst pollen, my allergist later told me was the flaky dead stuff. Great. So that is why having "cedar fever" reminds me of my childhood. And what on earth does that have to do with Christmas? I am not looking for sympathy, but I do have an idea.
Life got so much better for me when my Dad took down the old dead tree, hauled it out of our house, and hopefully burned it! I started to recover. That is just like our lives. If we keep old dead ideas, harmful habits or just plain meanness, i.e sin around, it can make us sick. Oh, not at first. You can take it, breathe ok, live with it just fine, but eventually it starts to show up in our lives. It makes us sick. Physical sickness is bad enough, but being spiritually sick is the worst. Whatever is keeping our Christmas from being magical: money worries, family quarrels, fatigue, stress of getting it all done perfectly, just invite Jesus in and throw it out. Lots of things can pollute the air of your holiday and make you sick.Today, let's toss the old, dead, sinful and just plain mean. It is Christmas, it is Jesus' birthday, the best holiday ever! It is a time to celebrate the baby!
"..whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things…and the God of peace will be with you." Philippians 4:8-9
Pray:
Father, help us to clean out the sickening things in our lives, that which keeps us from focusing on the real meaning of Christmas. Let us breathe in the clean air of your love come to earth in the form of a baby. Help us to become well in you. Amen
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