A grown-up sort of Christmas.

Sometimes you write a whole paragraph only to delete it, but somehow this paragraph provides the foundation for the one that follows.

I sat down to write about Christmas and how I'm finally getting it. I wanted to say that I've had an epiphany that has somehow made the whole consumer culture thing foreign to me. So, I pretended for one paragraph, deleted, and now I'm starting over because the truth is that I've had no such epiphany.

I'm only less of a consumer this year because my pockets are typically twenty-something - shallow and holey.
I want to find a new place of contentment. As it is, I'm in a cylce of chasing the fulfillment of wants and created needs. I'm on the hunt for the next thing before I've taken the last out of its packaging. I need to be happy with what I have. I need to be a better steward of what I've been given. Today, I'm not even happy with my life because it's all out of order. It's not that the things I need aren't there; they're just out of order.

If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don't you think he'll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I'm trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God's giving. People who don't know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don't worry about missing out. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

- Jesus, Matthew 6:30-33

Preoccupied: ding ding ding! It's okay, I guess, for a five-year-old to lose sleep for curiosity of what's under the tree, but for me, at twenty-two, I will respond to God's giving this year by acknowledging that every good gift comes from His hand. I will be content with what I have. I will respond to God's giving by giving what I have out to those who have less than me.