The Christmas Spirit

Everywhere you look, every time you turn on the T.V., or pick up a newspaper all you see and hear is the economy and the  mess we are in. Most everyone is looking for a way out and looking to our new President to help lead the way. Even in my own family, the way seems bleak.  They keep thinking this is going to be a Christmas without too many gifts.
Well, I remember so many Christmas’s when I was a little girl, we hardly knew what gifts were. We would get a bag of fruit and a small bag of candy and we were so thrilled over it.  Christmas to us wasn’t worry and fretting over whether or not we would get presents. It was about the birth of Jesus.
Daddy would get up first and build a fire in the fireplace. As soon as it got warm enough, we would jump out of bed and run in there to get our fruit and candy. A happy bunch of kids we were, too!  We were poor, but so was almost everyone else back then.
I remember that my brother Robert’s wife, Kate, would always send us a cardboard box with little hair-bows, small toys and such. I never forgot that!!  She was so sweet to us, and still is; A woman who is in her eighties now and has worked hard all her life; Raised five sons, a wonderful mother and wife, who didn’t have an easy life with our brother, who in later years let alcohol almost ruin him and his family.
There is not a one of the eleven sisters and brothers who hasn’t had hard times every now and then and we may have gotten knocked down but by the Grace of a loving God, we never stayed down.
Sherry and Sue both have been depressed over the state of circumstances lately,  and I will have to admit I was beginning to fill a little that way myself.  But I just talked to God about it and asked Him to help us have the best Christmas ever by reminding us how far He has brought us in our lives.
Sherry just had two surgeries since May and almost lost her life both times. Sue  broke her hip, which left her with a limp, but it could have killed her. She lay in her sun-room floor several hours before  anyone came to her rescue BUT God was with both of them.
Libby ( my best friend), her son, Warren, and I went to Charlotte Farmers Market today and dropped into Cracker Barrel for dinner. Everything was so festive and decorated for Christmas. But one young black man was walking through the front entrance handing out candy and wishing customers a Merry Christmas. He handed me some candy and laughed and asked “Did your mama not ever tell you to not take candy from a stranger?” I laughed and told him at my age it didn’t matter! But you know what, after awhile I caught myself singing along with the Christmas carols and smiling along with everyone else. IT CAUGHT ON!
I told him I didn’t have a dab of Christmas spirit when I walked in there and thanked him for what he was doing. He remarked that Christmas was only one day but he tried to be that way every day!
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could just start trying to smile a little more, Hug a little more and most of all Thank God a WHOLE lot more.   For Families and friends who love us and a God who loves us MORE!
I called Sherry when I got home and told her I was tired of looking at those big brown sad eyes. That I wanted her to start remembering what God had done for her this year and what He had brought her through.Then tomorrow night we were going to take Mark with us and go to Second Baptist Church to hear Lynn (Sherry’s daughter-in-law) sing in their Christmas Cantata.
I don’t know what kind of Christmas you are going to have this year, but I am going to have a MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY HAPPY NEW YEAR!