Duck and Run!...

...As my great Uncle Dave would say. They're playing the corny christmas music in stores. The mall is lit up like a Chinese restaurant. Wal-Mart opened at 5 am this morning (to a line of hundreds who'd been waiting since 3 am in 15 degree weather). I'm at work because there was no chance that my husband (who works in retail) would have been allowed this day off - the infamous "Black Friday", the day after thanksgiving, when the sale signs go up and all sanity comes crashing down...

The holiday season has been doing it's reconesense for months, has strategically positioned itself in our very homes, and the signal was given last night when all the Turkey's came out of the ovens - ATTACK!!

Cover your tail - duck and run.

Can you guess I don't really like the holidays?

It's not really so much dislike of the holidays as dislike of the fanfare of the holidays. I hate fanfare. I only went to my high school graduation because my parents made me. I was married barefoot in a living room. I don't like big to-dos. I want to be wherever the fanfare isn't. I've never liked the holidays with all their parties and expectations. They're just one big to-do. And now that I'm married, there's twice the to-doing, because I've got two families who revel in the fanfare I've tried my whole life to avoid.

Duck and run.

Let me give you a brief overview of my holidays:

Night before Thanksgiving:
-Decorate parents-in-law's family tree

Thanksgiving day:
-Christmast #1 with Stephan's family
-Thanksgiving dinner with mother-in-law's family (she's the eldest of 12-it's BIG)

Christmas Day:
-In our line up it's Christmas #2, for just me and Stephan. No family allowed.

New Year's Eve:
-Christmas #3 with my family
-New Year's Eve countdown

Last year we had this same line up, and I hated every minute of it. Everyone was vying for me and my husband's time - including us. Stephan was still in school then, and I felt robbed of the sparse moments we could really take to ourselves - and no one cared. All they cared about was having 'their baby' and spouse come 'home' for the holidays.

But it's the day after Thanksgiving now. I've made it through round 1. I've crossed 1 and 1/3 major holidays off the list for this year. Was it as horrible as I discribed it to be?

Not really. So what changed? Nothing. My circumstaces are pretty solid. So what happened? Why was this year different from last?

Because my heart was different. I read a very helpful devotional on one of my favorite blogs yesterday:

"Sometimes the very people with whom we have the most difficulty are members of our own family. Since the holidays typically provide opportunities to spend time with extended family, it is important that we prepare our hearts to honor God on these occasions. This year (and every year that follows, of course!) let’s choose the way of the prudent, described in Proverbs 22:3: “The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it.” In other words, we need to think about the unique temptations that we face each holiday when we are with our families (this is seeing danger), and then we need to devise a plan to not sin and please God instead (this is hiding ourselves)."

(This was taken from Girl Talk, a post on Nov 17 by Carolyn Mahaney)

Here she's speaking specifically of struggles with family, but the principle can be applied to any temptation: even my dislike of the fanfare. The post goes on to suggest that we pray to prepare for the holidays, to fortify ourselves against our specific temptations to sin, and also that we pray to love our families. I have unsaved family members. What do I want them to remember about the christian they interacted with during the holidays? Do I want to be crabby on the holidays, or do I want to bring glory to God's gospel by pursuing godliness? My head difinitely wants the later, but my fallen heart must be convinced otherwise.

My quiet time yesterday was amazing. I'm reading through Romans, and yesterday the Lord met me with this:

"Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness." -Romans 6:16-18

I wrote this in my journal: "I am presenting myself as an obedient slave to either my sin or to righteousness. Neither forces me - I present myself, I submit to the rule of that master." How amazing. I'm reminded of Gulliver when he arrives in Lilliput. The people around him are mere inches tall, but Gulliver presented himself as an all-compliant servant to the tiny king of that country. Those Lilliputians could not force Gulliver to do anything given his comparative size, yet he willingly presented himself as a slave to the king, and called him master. My sin has no more power than I give it. I have a clear choice of what I will be a slave to, and for so many years I've been choosing enslavement to my sins of judgement, pride, anger, bittnerness and just plain self-centeredness during the holidays. When I do that, of course I don't enjoy them.

This year? This year I was a slave to righteousness. I prayed before I interacted with any family. I asked God to help me see the blessing in my in-laws...all 6,000 of them. I asked God to help me put Philipians 2:3-4 into practice:

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others."

I kept this verse as my power verse for the whole day and prayed continually that God would enable me to put it into practice. Did it work? Well, when I said goodbye to one of my Aunts, she said "You and Stephan just look so happy..."

May God accept the glory for my happiness that day!
Have a great holiday season, and Remember the Gospel!