Merry Christmas! I hope these days have been good for you – filled with delight and wonder. I know that’s not the case for everyone, but I wish it were. As this Christmas ends, my heart feels inexplicably heavy, and I wonder if others are experiencing this as well. It’s not the way I would wish to finish what is traditionally considered a most joyous season.

My wish for Christmas Future (because we can’t change the others) is that we won’t lose our focus to the things in the margins. The details are not what make Christmas. The gifts and the food are not what make Christmas. Traditions, while fundamentally good things, are not what make Christmas. Love is what makes Christmas.

And if the weight of tradition is keeping you trapped in the margins and away from the perfect love of God that came down to earth on that first Christmas, my prayer is that you will find a way to step even a little bit away and see where you might be able to adjust for next time. That is my prayer for you, and it’s my prayer for myself. May we have those moments of reverence and reflection, but also those incredible bursts of unbridled joy alongside them. May we rediscover a simple, quiet, magical, love-filled Christmas that we can have in our hearts all year.

“I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.” – Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” Luke 2:11 (ESV)