From a young age my family had instilled in me Christmas traditions and expectations that formed the way that I saw December 25th.  The night before we would always make cookies and leave them out for Santa Clause to eat and give him energy to deliver presents all over the world.  After that we would be sent to bed early because “Santa would not come if we were still awake”.  I remember countless times of just sitting in bed trying to fall asleep, but was to excited that I would sit there for hours until I couldn’t hold my eye lids open anymore.  And then all of a sudden we would all wake up, usually around 5-6am, and then run over to my parents room to wake them up so we could see what Santa brought us.  We weren’t allowed to go into the living room where Santa would leave the presents until everybody was up, so we would sit in the hall trying to rush our parents to get ready because we were overwhelmed with excitement.  When they were ready and gave us the ok, we would run down the hall and look for our presents.  Santa always brought the big ones.  After we were done opening up the presents, we would sneak away and play with those gifts and wait until the rest of my aunts and uncles would show up with another set of presents.

Christmas had always been about what was I going to get and who was going to give the best presents.  To be honest I didn’t care about who gave what, I just wanted good presents.  Over the years I began to get a good idea for who was going to give what kind of presents and who’s I would enjoy the most.  Depending on who gave the best gifts, that person became my favorite person for the day.  Worth became based on the materialism that was given and as I grew up, this really affected me in how I gave gifts.  It became about finding my worth in what present I would get for others.  It had to be the best because I wanted them to think highly of me.  And on those years that money was tight I got really embarrassed because I couldn’t afford the very best for the people I loved.   The gift became the center of the holiday and it wrecked me because of all the guilt and shame it brought on when my bank just couldn’t handle getting everybody a gift.  It got to a point where I started to dread the part when we exchanged gifts because it just made me feel like a horrible person.  But what could I do?

But is that really what Christmas is about?  Giving the right gift or spending all your money on people?  When we focus on what we get, or give, the reality is that we have made Christmas about ourselves.

I feel like we have taken the true meaning of Jesus Christ, our savior being born and turned it into our own selfishness and what we should get out of it.  It’s no wonder people want to take Christ out of Christmas, we have made it out to be about our greed and an excuse to waste our money on things that we think we want but really don’t need. We need to bring back the reason for the season.  How can we celebrate CHRISTMAS when we take center stage?

This year, let’s really evaluate our lives and take inventory on how we celebrate Christmas.  Instead of spending tons of money on people that have everything, try giving money or food to those who could really use it.    Worship Him and spread His story, that is how Jesus would want you to celebrate His birthday.  Enjoy the Christmas season and remember that without Christ, there is no Christmas!