“Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before! What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”
― Dr. Seuss, How the Grinch Stole Christmas

I love this quote by Dr. Seuss. We all know that Christmas isn’t really about the tinsel, lights, candy, presents, or incessant holiday baking. Really. We know that.

And yet I think it is easy for many of us to be so caught up in a whirlwind of activities, we’ve blinked and it’s New Years Day. Christmas can come and go without a pause, it seems.

I’m a firm believer in Advent – taking time out during the month of December to to wait…to make room in our hearts for Christ and His bountiful love to fill and overflow us.

To ensure that we focus on what is most important to us, we have to be intentional about shedding any, um, unnecessary tinsel 🙂

Here are 8 Tips to help you make time for what is most important this month:

1. Plan ahead – Wait! you may think! it’s too late to do that now. Au contraire, my friend! What do you really want to make time for this Christmas? Quality time with friends or family members?  Reading Scripture and in prayer? Visiting a special site or participating in a service project close to your heart?

Set out to make those activities highest on your list. Plan out the most feasible times for these things to happen and commit to it.

2. Don’t feel pressure to do things just because others are doing them. Today I got the cutest Christmas card in the mail. A gorgeous family photo with a well-thought out letter summarizing their year. I loved it! Am I going to write a letter, get pictures printed, address envelopes, and send them out?

Maybe not. If I have time I will, but it’s not the most important item on my list, so you may all be getting a Christmas email from our family this year 🙂 And I’m okay with that!

3. Choose to attend events and parties that are the most enjoyable and meaningful for you and your family. This is a time of year when your email inbox may be overflowing with invites, which is a fabulous problem! Again, don’t feel like you have to say yes to every one of them.

Choose those that will be fun and meaningful without taking away from needed down time in the midst of the activity.

4. Buy fewer gifts, but make them more meaningful. Growing up, my family members purchased one main present for each person from the other and put some thought into it. When we go to open them, we spend more time really enjoying each one rather than opening 50 gifts and not even remembering who gave us what.

This simplifies the gift-giving process and also means that when I look for a gift for one of my daughters, I’m not just going into Target and buying whatever cute thing I see. I want to choose something she will really delight in and use regularly.

NOTE TO PARENTS: This approach also de-stresses your life because there are less toys to clean up and less clutter around your house.

5. Buy gifts online whenever possible – We have this beautiful thing called the internet that allows us to search, find, click, and ship in only minutes. It saves us trips to crowded stores, impulse purchases, gas money, and headaches.

I like to get a hot cup of something, turn on some festive music, and knock out my shopping – shipping all over the country for FREE with Amazon Prime (2 day shipping, nonetheless!) in a matter of a few hours.

Bam. Done. More time for other things.

6. Enjoy the people around you – I know it’s hard sometimes 🙂 But if you have a huge crowd invading your home for a week (and you aren’t that thrilled about it) make a choice beforehand of how you are going to handle any relatives annoying comments or behavior.

7. Steal some time away – alone – Take a walk alone at night and enjoy the silence while looking at the lights in your neighborhood. Get a cup of coffee at your local coffee shop and take a time out. Do something that is relaxing and rejuvenating for you personally.

8. Don’t sweat the small stuff! – So the tinsel never got hung? You had to give store bought cookies to the neighbors instead of your homemade peppermint bark? It’s okay. Really. Don’t sweat the small stuff!

What is your favorite aspect of the Christmas season? How have you made time to slow down and focus on Christ in this time? I would love to hear from you!

I stare at the small figurines on my mantle and don’t question why they were there. What would the manger scene be without the shepherds?!

But why did God choose this group of men to be the first to hear His greatest announcement in history?

Pastor and teacher John MacArthur shares in a sermon on Luke 2, “You know, it’s the most unlikely group of people to make this proclamation to. If you were orchestrating this, if you were a PR agent and you were designing a campaign to announce that the Savior of the world had been born, the last people you would go to is a bunch of shepherds. I mean, literally the last people you would go to.

You might say…Well, we want to get this thing out, we need to go the people who have the greatest influence. We want to go to the influencers, as they would be called today. We want to go to the movers and the shakers. We want to go to the people who have the ear of the world….Shepherds? Not on your life.”

To the high priest? Sure, that would make sense.

To the chief religious leaders? Absolutely.

But never to the shepherds.

The Lowliest of Tasks

MacArthur explains this reasoning: “It isn’t that there was somehow a shameful profession, it was just a lowly profession, it was the lowliest of tasks. Shepherds were insignificant. They were basically ignorant. They were uneducated. They were unskilled. They did the kind of work, shepherding, that was generally given to children to do because it was so simple to do…They really were the lowest of low…the least special of all people.”

To Whom Does Jesus Come?

Jesus will always come to the lowly in heart, the least of these, the hungry, the poor, the lost, the broken, the spiritually, emotionally, and physically wounded.

In fact, He promises us that “…not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence” 1 Corinthians 1:26-29.

Isn’t it just like God to come to the outcasts of society?

I close my eyes for a moment and try to imagine what happened to the shepherds of Bethlehem that night. They stood dirty and weary from dusty days on the hills tending their sheep without much rest.

They were rejected people. They were lonely people. And out of the blackest of night, a heavenly light burst forth and the angelic choir of all choirs began to serenade them with the divine announcement: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:14).

With Whom is Jesus Pleased?

Let it touch us afresh that God doesn’t necessarily come to the most beautiful, educated, religious, or well-dressed.

He comes to the lowly. To those who will bow down and worship Him, rather than themselves.

He chooses the people that the world throws away.

He picks them up, gives them a new heart, shows them they are loved – and they find they don’t care anymore whether or not they are praised and received by men.

They have an audience with Heaven.

Let us wake up to the reality of a God who visits lonely people in humble places.

The God who will come to all who make room for Him in their homes and hearts.

Come to us, Lord. Even unto us. And then let us go and do likewise.