The Less Project: Looking Backward

Merry Belated Christmas to you and yours!  

Meet P. Fitzwilliam Darcy, better known as Fitz.

I hope your season was--and is--bright with the Light of Christ. 

Amen.

May I confess that I've started and discarded a dozen posts this month.  With my classes on hold until January, this month seemed the perfect time to return to blogging.

Only it wasn't.

This post, however, this post has been in my brain for a while, waiting post-Christmas, end-of-the-year reflection.  

Other bloggers are posting their "best of 2014".

 2014 got the best of me.

My word for the year was "less".

I envisioned clean closets, clutter-free counters, maybe even some minimalist decorating.

And there was some of that.

Like this year's Christmas, with its silver and white and green and pine.

(Having a red-free tree stressed me out for about five minutes, and then I found it soothing, somehow.)

But mostly, this year has felt like, well, less.

I can't even put a super-spiritual spin on my less-ness in 2014 

and say I learned there should be less of me, more of Him;

 truth be told, I've come face-to-face this year with just how much of me is still lurking around, 

and it's not pretty. 

With this year's tiny church plants and half-empty nest,

 its class-from-Hades and its what-was-I-thinking-return-to-college, 

it left me feeling half-empty, too.

There were  lots of good things--I counted 1000 of them!-- 

but with more stress and more questions, 

there was less blogging, less creating...

less focus, less discipline,

  less confidence, less peace, less purpose.

Just...less.

The Lord's been patient with me here, 

and He's talked to me about my dangerous propensity for nostalgia.  

He's given me a word for 2015 that amounts to a holy kick in the pants; 

I'll share it later on.

I think less was the prerequisite course.  

It's time to pack a lighter suitcase for 2015.

Following,

Ginger

Grace Enough

I had some posts all planned...deep thoughts on grace given through the holidays, the love-hate relationship some of us have with December, etc, etc,

but then the flu hit, and that's all she wrote.

So today, I'll just share a song that's been on repeat at my house even though it's not a Christmas song per se.

It is the message of Christmas, however; 

because Christ came, there is grace enough for the Lord to cover my sin, call me daughter, wrap me in His endless wonder.

Grace enough to give up a throne for a manger.

Grace enough to die on a cross.

Grace enough to satisfy both righteous wrath and righteous love.

Merry Christmas.

To bring this world to life

  

To heal this heart of mine

               

Your grace enough

              

Your grace enough





To mend this world in need

  

To break the chains in me

                

Your grace enough

               

Now this means love


   

The weight of all our sin upon 




His shoulders

     

That we should all be called

             

Your sons and daughters

 Tab from: http://www.guitaretab.com/h/hillsong-united/266201.html ]




Father




Heaven and earth collide

               

In the endless wonder

    Of Your love upon the cross

           

We will follow

      

And offer this life forever

               

To see Your love unfold



Adopted as Your own




Alive to make You known

             

this means love

              

This means love

                         

For the lost and for the broken

                              

For the slave and for the orphan

                 

For everyone to realize Your love

                    

From the famous to the faceless

                        

From the beggar to the king

              

For everyone to realize Your love



You restore the broken-hearted

                        

You bring freedom to the captive
For one and all

                         forever this means love



All Your children come together

                            

All Your sons and all Your daughters
Your grace enough



Forever this means love Singing

Noel

In his book Stories of Christmas Carols, Ernest Emurian writes of the obscure origins of the word "noel".  There is apparently much scholarly debate about Latin root words, but the most likely story rests in the English propensity to abbreviate phrases.  

For example, "Good be with you" condensed to "goodbye", "fare thee well", "farewell".

So  it is highly possible that lazy tongues also produced the word "nowell" from an old Christmas morning greeting, "Now all is well."

Now all is well.

In a world run rampant with troubles, a Savior has been born!

Now all is well!

Except

all is not well.

Or so it seems in circumstances.

Ugly divorces, pressure from every direction, disease that robs young and old.

The general unloveliness of people.

All, indeed, is not well.

If my eyes are focused on my surroundings, I risk living, as Anne Voskamp writes, as though Christmas is a myth. 

I risk living joyless, hopeless.

Part of the problem, I think, is that even we who profess Christ have made Christmas about us.

In one way, of course, it was about us. 

Christ came to earth, our Emmanuel, to rescue His people, those on whom His favor rests.

Yet we miss the first part of the story that says, "Glory to God in the Highest!"

The great and glorious and highest God has made this thing happen--

He is mighty to save,

loving in all His ways,

the Redeemer and Rescuer of His people.

The Hero of the story is not the princess in the tower;

it's the Prince of Peace.

He's here.

Now all is well.

He's coming again.

And all will be well.

Following,

Ginger

Linking here and here and here.

Creating a Heirloom

Quilting purists, avert your eyes.

I chopped up a quilt.

In my defense, it saved a quilt from near disintergration; had it been in terrifc shape I wouldn't have done it.

As it is, one pitiful quilt is now several heirlooms--and that's good!

We think this quilt was made by my great grandmother.

The pattern is "Drunkard's Path", but my mother--who was a quilter--and picky about this sort of thing--says that the pattern wasn't put together correctly.

I haven't a clue.

I loved that quilt, though, and it's been on my couch for quite a few years.

 A while back, however, I noticed that age was leaving it close to tatters in spot, and it needed to be salvaged before it came completely apart.

Answer: Christmas stocking for all the great-great grandkids.

(And the long-suffering, would-be seamstress, but I digress.)

Stockings are an easy-peasy project for non-sewing sewers such as myself.

Trace a pattern,

cut it out.

Right sides together.

Add a hanger from bias tape.

Ta-da!

New, old heirlooms.

For the record, OCD daughter who detests all change with a purple passion

loves having the stocking but does not want us to use them 

because they are not the old ones we've always used.

Sigh.

Since she is a senior, she gets her way.

What are some of your must-use decorations?

Anything new?

Following,

Ginger

Glory Revealed

Popping in briefly today--

home with my annual chest cold and laryngitis

 (and probably back at school tomorrow with said problem if no subs materialize soon.

  Pain in the patootie.)  

Between tea and naps, I thought I'd share our simple but sweet mantel.

 It got a few lights to make it twinkle at night.

In Isaiah,  

the glory of the LORD was a future promise.

In the gospels, 

it became the promised reality.

Today,

it is past, present, and future.

The glory revealed 

in the manger

on the cross

in the empty tomb

will be revealed in my today,

and we await His coming again

when all will see

the glory of the LORD revealed.

We Have a Savior

**Don't forget about the Christmas CD giveaway.  Lurkers, de-lurk! :)**

This Christmas season, I've been doing the Good Morning Girls Advent devotional every morning.  Yesterday we went to the story of the shepherds.

These are familiar verses, a story I've read a thousand times, but, as happens, something new jumped out at me.

"And this will be sign unto you: you'll find the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger."

This will be a sign to you.

Um, hello, there are angels talking.

Out of sky.

While these poor shepherds are out there in the field minding their own business, doing what shepherds do--*bam!* a heavenly host of angels appeared.

And they need another sign?

Yet, here's the thing:

they didn't just need a sign.

They needed a Savior.

I needed a Savior.

I know my heart.

I know the anger, the unbelief, the selfishness, the shame, that resides there.

I know I can't fix it.

I can't Oprah-feel-good-high-self-esteem it away.

I needed a Savior.

The shepherds needed a sign because an angel sighting wasn't going to cut it.

Cool, but useless by itself.

Angels can't save; The Savior can save.

The only Savior is Jesus.

Hebrews 12:2 says He endured the cross for the joy set before Him.  Jude says--remarkably, amazingly--that I was that joy.

You were that joy.

Because He not only endured the cross but scorned its shame, He will one day present me before the Father without blemish and with great joy.

Leaping, dancing joy.

No wonder the angels called that good tidings of great joy.

We have a Savior.

Be blessed,

Ginger

Secret Santas and the Falliablity of Flu Shots

For the first time in about seven years, I got a flu shot this year.

For the first time in about ten years, I've got the flu.

The pharmacist informed me cheerfully this morning that my flu shot should at least lesson the duration of the nastiness.

That's something, I suppose.

Anyway, I unexpectedly have time to do a bit of planning for one of my favorite holiday traditions: Secret Santas.

At my school, participating teachers and staff draw names and trade goodies the last week before school gets out for break.

Since gift-giving is one of my love languages, I'm quite sure that I have more fun than the recipient.  

I don't have my person's name yet, so right now I'm just browsing for general cuteness.  If it's cute, cheap, and creative (the CCC test), I'm all over it. If I draw one of the few male teachers who participate, I'll just buy a two-pound bag of M&M's, slap a bow on it, and call it good! ;-)

Things that pass the CCC test so far:

Candy Cane dip and an apple-yum!:

 

Pumpkin Spice Creamer:

 

Microwave Popcorn +gloves:

 

I've already bought the polish  (the NYC brand to keep the "cheap" part in place) to do these for my lunch table buddies:

 

So, how about you?  What's your favorite small gift to give (or receive)?

Be blessed,

Ginger