{"id":1933,"date":"2011-11-28T11:13:31","date_gmt":"2011-11-28T16:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/redletters\/?p=1933"},"modified":"2011-11-28T11:13:31","modified_gmt":"2011-11-28T16:13:31","slug":"are-you-prepared-for-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2011\/11\/are-you-prepared-for-christmas.html","title":{"rendered":"Are you prepared for Christmas?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I’m guessing you are thinking of presents, food, travel plans, Christmas parties, out of town company, and everything else that consumes our busy American Christmas season.<\/p>\n

But I said are you prepared for Christmas<\/strong><\/span>…Not “Giftmas” as one national retailer termed it this morning in a “Cyber Monday” email.<\/p>\n

And that is the choice we all face at this time of year. Will you choose Christmas or Giftmas?<\/p>\n

\u00bb5 ways to make Christmas more meaningful.<\/a><\/strong>\u00ab<\/p>\n

Giftmas is about stuff that doesn’t matter. It’s about getting the best stuff at the lowest prices. Giftmas focuses on ourselves, and our own desires. Giftmas is stress and bad sweaters.<\/p>\n

Christmas is about the one gift that matters. It’s about preparing your heart for the advent of Jesus Christ, God-made-flesh. And over generations of retelling that sacred story we’ve lost the wonder and magic of the real<\/strong> Christmas.<\/p>\n

My co-worker’s 7-year-old son said, “It must have been weird for Mary to have God in her stomach.”\u00a0 <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

I hadn’t thought about it that way in a while. Have we lost sight of something so obviously magical?\u00a0 God reduced himself to fit inside the womb of a young girl…and we pass right over that and a million other wondrous parts of the Christmas story.<\/p>\n

Let’s get the wonder back…<\/strong><\/p>\n

Share your idea in the comments section…what’s one<\/strong> thing you can do to get the wonder back this Christmas?<\/p>\n

I’ll share mine–but the rest is up to you–leave a comment.<\/p>\n

Make a list of 10 things that amaze you about Jesus’ birth story<\/strong>. Read and pray over those passages, asking God for deeper insight, and greater wonder.<\/p>\n

Join\u00a0 Change Their Story<\/a><\/strong>. Share your Christmas with orphans who are trapped by extreme poverty and sex trafficking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m guessing you are thinking of presents, food, travel plans, Christmas parties, out of town company, and everything else that consumes our busy American Christmas season. But I said are you prepared for Christmas…Not “Giftmas” as one national retailer termed it this morning in a “Cyber Monday” email. And that is the choice we all…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,8,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity","category-current-affairs","category-orphans"],"yoast_head":"\nAre you prepared for Christmas? - Red Letters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2011\/11\/are-you-prepared-for-christmas.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Are you prepared for Christmas? - Red Letters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I’m guessing you are thinking of presents, food, travel plans, Christmas parties, out of town company, and everything else that consumes our busy American Christmas season. 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A tireless advocate for fatherless children, Davis has spent most of his adult life calling U.S. believers to become the hands and feet of Jesus Christ to the 143 million orphans living around the world. Through those connections, thousands of orphans now have the bright and hopeful future--one that is filled with opportunities and the love of the one true Father. Davis speaks hundreds of times each year at churches and conferences, mobilizing the church to action on behalf of the poor. He is the author of four books. His most recent novel, SCARED is a fictionalized account of his first-hand experiencing living and working with orphans in Swaziland, Africa. Davis' blog is the premier resource for the latest developments in Christian orphan ministry. Davis also currently teaches courses as adjunct professor at George Fox University in Newberg, OR. When not traveling the globe, Davis resides in the mountains of Colorado in the small community of Palmer Lake. He and his wife Emily have seven children, including two adopted daughters from Russia.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/author\/tdavis"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1933"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1942,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933\/revisions\/1942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}