On Parenthood, Motherhood, and Gratitude

Yesterday afternoon, I crawled up on my couch after work and while the kids were still at daycare to watch the season finale of Parenthood. Let's be honest, I haven't been able to stay up until 11pm on a Thursday night in quite some time, so this Friday afternoon watchfest has become a sort of ritual. This show is one of my favorites, mainly because of its honest depiction of life. That, plus the fact that Craig T. Nelson has reminded me of my dad since starred on the show Coach, and this show pretty much had me from the get-go.

As I watched the story play out yesterday, I honed in on the Julia and Joel storyline. I feel a kindred connection to Julia's character (minus the part about cheating on my husband). She was portrayed as a go-getter, a woman who always was after success. Stanford degree, high-powered law firm, she was me. When she lost her job on the show, it sent me into long, contemplative thoughts about what we would do if I couldn't work, how that would change me as person. It revealed how much I value my title and the work I put into getting a P.A. degree. It made me think about how much pride I take when a paycheck goes into the bank with my name on it. Yes, a tv show had the ability to really make me think.

As I watched the finale as Joel and Julia decide to adopt Victor's little sister, something clicked in my head. Sometimes the best things in life are unplanned. If you know me at all, you know I like plans. 5 year plans, plans for next weekend, life goals, plans for potential economic downturns. You get the picture. I think Julia was a planner too, but here she was just throwing caution to the wind, I mean, a new baby, and like she said, they didn't even have room in the house (which Joel so cutely dispels because he can just build one). But what really got me was the scene when they fast forward and the FOUR children are opening up a puppy on Christmas morning. I don't know why that hit me so hard, but FOUR kids! Maybe it's because Brad and I have been spending a lot of time talking about how two kids might be enough for us, but I'm still not sure. Or maybe it is because it showed that plans are certainly not fool-proof and joy can be in the unexpected. Maybe it's because this show reminds me of my mom's family and how close they are and how there are just so many kids around and there is so much love in just being family. Or maybe it's all of the above.

I, like probably everyone in America that watches this show, audibly sobbed as Zeke asked Sarah if he was a good dad. Floods of childhood memories came flooding back into my head. The scene from my wedding day played as I asked my dad if he was ready to give me away and his response was, "No, but let's do this!" It made me want to hold my boys right now in this moment and smell their hair and listen to their laughter and capture their innocence for another day. It makes me think about my life and what the answer to the question, "Am I a good mother?" is. I mean, I just don't get this emotional watching the Housewives of New Jersey! Camille and Zeke's relationship reminds me of my parents. Both of them being so much about their kids and then having to face some pretty big changes in their empty nest years.

The parallels are enormous. And I know that I'm not alone. The struggles every Braverman family went through week after week are our struggles. They told our stories. And therein lies the greatness of this show. Therein lies why I will miss crying every Friday afternoon.  I got to see my life mirrored back to me. I got to glimpse the special-ness of the ordinary in my own family. It left me with gratitude.

It left me grateful for struggles that I share with a family that loves me. It left me with gratitude that I have these incredibly amazing boys that I get to love and teach and, some days, lose my mind with for the rest of my life. It left me with more appreciation for the now, the unplanned, and the surprises. I'm sad that this show ended, but I think it's appropriate, because it felt too short, it felt like there was so much more we could learn together, but then doesn't life feel the same way? Don't we take for granted what we have, thinking there will always be time for this or that? I am filled with gratitude that, with all the mundane, mindless media out there, this show was able to have meaning for me beyond the screen. I will mourn the loss for a couple more days, but I will take with me the lessons the show has taught me about myself, and I am inspired because it has shown me that showing the real side of life, like I strive to on this blog, can mean so much to so many!

Tired of being tired

Noises wake me up, a car engine running too long outside my window (aka looters about to break into my house...<begin creating escape plans while half asleep>) will force me out of bed to investigate, and just all the thoughts that go through my head in a day seem to resurface in those precious hours of rest. I am a light sleeper and I have been this way for my whole life. What I didn't realize was that becoming a mother would add a whole new dimension to this lack of sleep.

Let me be honest, I am not a woman who loves every second of being pregnant. I'm going to tell you I appreciated the miracle God has given women in the fact that from a few cells, an ENTIRE human is made. What I didn't appreciate was the uncomfortable positions this little person could push their way into the smallest recesses of my midsection. I also didn't appreciate that I could no longer sleep on my belly, which I had been doing for the 28 previous years.  This was stage one of feeling tired ALL the time!

Then the baby arrives and as Amy Poehler so honestly puts it in her book Yes Please!, "you so afraid that they are going to die that you stay up and jump up at any slight noise." Add to that that I breast fed, and had to do that every two hours, while it takes me a good 45 minutes to return to sleep, and you do the math. I've been sleep deprived since 2010!

I thought when my kids slept through the night this would change. I would go back to feeling not tired, but that's not true. I think I remember reading studies during those blurry first years of mommyhood about sleep deprivation and how it just keeps banking up and you have to have days where you play catch up. Apparently I never slept when the baby slept because (1.) I did want some laundry clean and (2.) I went back to work.  My children have seemed to recover nicely from their erratic sleep and yes, they sleep through the night, but they are non-stop during the day.

What was also never stated in the books is that you don't get to choose your own bedtime. My children choose my bedtime. We have a set schedule, every night starting at 8pm, but my children are masterminds of prolonging the inevitable. Last night, Brad started the routine which usually means that he puts them to bed in their room, but at 10pm they were both laying in bed with me while Brad snoozed in their bedroom. We play musical beds nightly, and apparently I'm just a participant, I don't run the game!

Gone are the days when I would come home from work and peruse the internet for a little while and then flip over to an evening show or two before deciding I was tired and needed to go to bed. My nights are now filled with laughter, fighting, at least one sword fight a night (we don't even need a sword in the house, this still happens). I love our nights and really try to appreciate these little years, but honestly, I miss those days every so often where I wasn't responsible for another wonderful little person.

Most nights end with my little one talking his non-sensical, stream-of-conscience babble while I drift slowly into an uncomfortable sleep. Inevitably I wake up 2 hours later in some weird contortion between 2 children and feel like I had a great nap! This is when I can't get back to sleep and I usually watch all of the Bravo TV shows I can't watch while my kids are awake. Of course, I do get tired at some point, usually around an hour or two before I have  to be awake. Then I spend 30 minutes thinking about how little time I have to fall asleep and get any semblance of a decent night's sleep.

Some of my sweet friends with grown children have told me it will only be 18 years of this sleep deprivation! I would like to say, "Please do not say this to my slightly on the fritz mind as it is already sleep deprived and really could snap in seconds!" I start thinking about those days so far ahead, but then I feel guilty for wishing these exhausting years away. So what is the answer? I'm not really sure. I feel good when I'm rested but that doesn't happen all that often. I want to be a person that can live in the moment without wishing it away, which is hard to do when all I really want to do is sit on the couch and perhaps take a snooze.

I'm becoming more creative. I now know that I can lay on the couch and turn a video on and get a twenty minute nap in every once in a while. I still wake up to little bodies using me as their target as they cannonball off the upper portion of the couch. There are times I try to go to bed early on the nights it is not my turn to put the kids to bed, but there always is another "I love you" that needs to be said or a hug that needs to be given, which I don't mind at all. I have relinquished that fact that I will not feel well-rested in any month in the new year. And maybe that's where I need to redirect my thoughts and realize that it's my problem and not my kids' problem. I don't have to be with my children every waking moment that I'm not working. I am trying to encourage independent, non-reckless play and I say lots of prayers that these two things will happen. I need to ask for some time for myself, because there will never be time if I always put everyone else's needs first. I can't keep making judgements about myself based on this mommy group I've created in my head who watches everything I do and sneers at how I'm raising my kids.

I need to take a shot at a nap when available and trust that I will not wake up with markers on the walls or a new make-over via my boys. Or I just embrace it if that happens, that's why we buy washable markers (or I'll trudge on over to Pinterest for a solution). With all that said, I'm not sure I'm going to ever be well-rested, but I do know that I'm going try to be better about taking care of myself. I'm even thinking about starting a business called MWNN-"Moms Who Need Naps" and all the employees get 2 short naps a day, required. I'm pretty sure I'd pay good money for that! Who's in?

REJECTED!!!

                                           (Elizabeth Williams from my alma mater showing how it's done!)
Getting rejected is never fun. I realize that it shouldn’t affect me and I shouldn’t get as upset about it at this point in my life. I remember several of my high school crushes not returning the admiration I had for them…rejection. I remember getting told I wasn’t going to be in the sorority I had preffed…rejection. I also remember a few weeks ago when I submitted an article to a magazine and they said, “Thank you. But this won’t work for us right now. “ Rejection. So as you can see, being rejected in lots of different ways has left lasting stings along the way. I don’t think anyone is particularly thrilled with hearing, “You didn’t do enough” or “You aren't the right one.” These times in our life really drill in deep and they can be a crossroads, of sorts.

Regjections stick out like sore thumbs to me, because in all honesty, I have been accepted in many instances for most of my life. I had good friends in childhood and my teen years. I got into the college of my dreams. I was accepted into a sorority and while I thought I wasn’t going to enjoy it, I made friends that I still cherish today. I’ve been picked for sports teams. And I also didn’t get rejected by the one guy that mattered. Even typing this right now, I think, “Why are you complaining?” But the truth is, it doesn’t matter what form it comes in, rejection hurts.

I know as a parent I will have to deal with my kids facing rejection. My boys are pretty awesome, but I know that there will be a day that they want something so badly and it will slip through their fingers, or there will be a sport they are convinced they are great at and the coach doesn’t agree. It will happen. My heart already breaks because I’ve seen how sometimes these crushing blows knock people right off the trajectory they had aligned themselves on. My hope is that my sons have the ability and the perspective to realize that sometimes the trajectory needed to change.

When I think about life, of course I wish that I could skip the pain. I hate it. I hate feeling out of control (control and me are like BFFs). I hate not being able to just get over the feeling of losing out, of not making it. It’s like we are never suppose to feel the burn of rejection or mourn the loss of a dream. I just think that’s ridiculous! If you had a hope (and we are told constantly to "Aim for the stars"), and it doesn’t come to fruition and you’ve poured blood, sweat, and tears into it, then it hurts when it doesn’t happen. It is probably more devastating if it is a relationship or a life goal. We are given little room for the grieving process.

As I've mentioned before my BFF "Control" and I have this thing called a plan. A 5 year plan, a 20 year plan, a remodeling plan, you name it, I've got a plan for it! So when that planned trajectory is clear in my mind, and something happens to the flight path, I come a little unglued. I think this is where God is definitely pushing me this year, because if I think I am going on this trip of life and I am going to just stay in my comfort zone and have all my hopes and dreams come true just the way I have planned, that doesn't really isn't realistic.  But getting knocked out my comfort zone and off of the planned path is no less disappointing and is no less turbulent.  We don’t give the same grace to emotional turbulence as we do to the physical, even though I would argue emotional turbulence can be ten times worse. I think this is true for me mainly because I cannot separate my thoughts from myself. I can ruminate on that rejection every night for a long, long time. I have imaginary conversations in my head:

“Brain, please think about nice things, not the awful stuff that I’ve already lived with all day!”

“Lisa, that is next to impossible because this is ALL you’ve thought about ALL day!”

“Okay, well I’m going to pray about what I’m thankful for then and that will do it…Lord, thank you for my family. Thanks for my job, and my home, but Lord could you please take away this awful pit in my stomach every time I think about that rejection…DANGGIT!”

And begin the conversation with the brain again.

It’s so hard. We are so intertwined with our wants, desires, hopes, dreams, thankfulness,and  hurt. It’s really hard to separate all of it. If you are anything like me, you have this invisible audience of the world watching your every move, enjoying seeing you fail, ready to laugh and shout an “I told you so!” Maybe there are a few of those out there, but in reality I have a lot more supporters than I do audience members. And when I really think about it, the people that matter are there for me no matter what. I just so easily lose sight of this that so many days are harder than they probably need to be.

I’ve been fortunate in this life to be able to reflect on those rejections (since I still like to carry them around with me). I see that they may have made up a broken road, but it lead to many good things. And I have to remember that sometimes I have to accept the sidetrack to really put a fire back in my belly, or maybe the rejection is a chance to sort out what really is important in life. I know that writing, and for an audience greater than what I currently reach, is hard. There are lots of voices out there making noise and I have to be clear in what I’m saying or it just drowns in with the hum. This last submission rejection just means I have to study my material better. It means I have to write, write, and write some more. I know that a lot of people have gone years on end with hearing, “No, you're not what we are looking for,” and then when they figure out their niche, it clicks.

What I leave you with is this: we are all in this together. You with your rejection and me with mine. We don’t need to fix the rejection, we can all just sit here with it together and figure out our next moves. Maybe we can even motivate ourselves to try again, especially if it’s something we really want. I see these rejections as an opportunity to realize that this life is not going to be perfect and if I want something, I have to work for it, or let it go, or realize it is not right for me at this time in my life. What I cannot do is let it overcome me. I cannot let it define every day, every moment of my significance. Because the truth is, there are opportunities all around and if I’m not paying attention, the path that is started by a rejection may be one that was better than the planned path. And those might be the ones that could be the biggest life-changers of them all! 

New Year's Revolution

I remember setting up an elaborate seating arrangement that included a large wooden desk chair, a booster seat and some pillows. I faced it out my large bedroom window. Mind you, this was at the tender age of 4 or 5. It was from this makeshift throne that I started a conversation with God. It's interesting looking back how I just sensed this God that I heard about in Sunday School and that my Grandmother would talk about with us as she babysat my sister and I. I didn't have any concept of the ride I would take with the Divine at that young age, and of course how could I? The world really hadn't had a chance to rear it's ugly, dark head.

As I grew up, I went to church camp, became a believer (looking back, I wonder if my moment was really in that chair at the window), and starting living my life for Christ. That's something that may not come too hard for a older elementary student, but the burden seemed placed on me as now I was suppose to share this faith. I'm not a person who has ever felt like I needed to push my beliefs on others and now I feel that it's imperative that I do not push anyone into believing. But somewhere in the early stages of my faith journey, that was what I was told needed to happen. I really didn't have a great story that I felt was profound in any way. Most of my friends had some connection to church and my family was all pretty religious. I didn't really want to be responsible for converting anybody.

Then I grew up and moved away. I realized that my idyllic little Christian bubble was not going to work for the greater world who had been hurt by Bible-beaters, people who used their faith to wield power, and then there were the intellectuals who knew more Bible verses than I did, and had a counterpoint to everything I held as true. Funny, but while all this discontent raged in my mind, my heart and soul remembered those conversations between God and a 4-year-old girl. And then I met other people struggling and wondering about how faith belonged in a world where people would rather choose a side than find a middle ground. Maybe the best thing anyone has ever said to me was that while I was struggling with this burden of converting people, I had forgotten that the world already had a Savior. It wasn't my job to prove anything to them, instead it was my job to show them that a living God lived in me, and His preferred method of life is through love.

This has spurred a revolution to my old way of approaching this world. I no longer feel that I have show people the sin in their life and force a conversion (whew! I'm glad God resolved that idea, because I was freaked out by it!), and instead, I am only called to go to the ends of the earth and show love. That means I take part in the struggles of this world. I stand up for those that don't have a voice: the poor, the communities that are being discriminated against because of their skin color or their sexual orientation, women who are downtrodden by manipulation of their families or partners, and children who do not have access to the things that my kids take for granted.

I hope I cannot be grouped into a category because I'm for everyone in this life, I'm for God's love being shown to anyone who needs it. Liberal, conservative, alcoholic, perfectionist, we all know tragedy, we all know hardships. I cannot live like I'm in this life for myself, because if I take Jesus' words as truth, that I have to go out and make disciples, then I have to leave my usual haunts and step into places that God doesn't show up too often. Does that petrify me? Yup! Then I realize that God's asking me to trust in Him, that's where the "Do Not Fear" stuff comes in. On my own, I'm toast. But through God all things are possible. I've seen that more as I put trust in this invisible One who each day brings a new dawn. He who has given me perspective during a very trying year. He who allows me to travel to places that others pass by because of fear. And I am so grateful because the thing about God's love is that when I trust that He loves everyone just as much as He loves me, I see that love too. It's a comfort and it's addictive. I can no longer be all about me doing God's work because God is already there.

So this year, I'm not making any resolutions, because I tend to not keep those very long. This year I'm committing to this silent revolution, the "Irresistible Revolution" as Shane Claiborne calls it. One that shows God's love is bigger than politics, or individual nations, and most certainly, it's bigger than me. Life may throw a few thousand curveballs my way, and loving people who do a crappy job of loving me or even liking me stinks, but I'm ready, because I trust that love conquers all. And even if I'm wrong, I'm willing to err on the side of love every time.

The Longest Night of the Year

It’s almost here. The longest night EVER! Nope it’s not December 21^st, the winter solstice, as all the papers and scientists would have you believe. I’m talking about the night of December 24^th , you know, Christmas Eve. And here’s the reason this will be the longest night…

1. My children have decided that bedtime is for sissies.  No naps, no early bedtimes. I can’t even con them into a ride in the car to look at Christmas lights and perhaps, being strapped down in a safety seat, they will fall asleep.
2. We have 2 bikes to put together and the hours until Christmas Eve are dwindling. I work tomorrow and then it’s basically Christmas Eve, which means we will be up late (see #1 above) and have to be up later because we did not choose the free assembly option! We are so smart!
3. My children are EXCITED about Christmas. 2 weeks ago, Isaiah started crying when I told him Christmas was 14 days away. He said it was, “too far away, Mommy! And Santa will never get here!” Bennett just feeds off of Isaiah’s excitement so we truly have it coming.
4. This is where I get my paybacks I’m sure. I was the child up at 4 am, stomach feeling like a bunch of jumping beans, doing everything I could to stay in bed one more minute without bursting. I have no doubt my children will also be up early this holiday. So given that we will probably crash around 2 am, the two hour nap will be just what I need to start my day! ( BTW sorry mom and dad for being up at 4 am every Christmas)
5. We are leaving on a 12 hour car trip Christmas afternoon. I’m very excited about spending the holidays back in Michigan with my family. I’m not very excited about driving the distance that will get us there. If you read “The LONG Road Home” back in September, you will understand my hesitation to get back in my car. On a side note, Brad is on this trip, so at least I will not feel like the sole responsible adult for our littles.

I realize this whole list sounds like complaining, or in all honesty, it is complaining. The truth is, the holidays are my favorite time of year, and this year Advent has been such an emotional time for me. Maybe it’s because I feel like I’m waiting for a lot of things that are yet to come. I’ve never been a patient person.  And the holidays are great, I’ve loved traveling to see old friends, sharing memories with my kids, baking, eating, and planning. But it sure is exhausting! I love that my kids have gotten to give to others and see that Christmas isn’t all about them. I’m so proud that they were all into the Christmas performance at church (even if Bennett took out a poinsettia or two). I’m ready to be in my parent’s new home and to just be there. No work, no on-call nights, and lots of aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends to just be with. So even though the longest night is coming, I’m hoping my longest night (and Brad’s too) will be followed by a couple long nights of rest, rejuvenation, and maybe a good glass of wine!

Merry Christmas Everyone! May you know that a child was born for you! A son was given for you, because God loves you so much and even if your holiday feels like the longest night of your life, know that God came here to be the dawn in the darkness! Many blessings~Lisa

Finding Joy All Over Again

Today we celebrated the 3rd Sunday in Advent, the Sunday of Joy. I automatically started singing the little song we learned in Sunday School many years ago, "I've got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart." [Insert your most screeching, annoying voice] "Where?" "Down in my heart!" But it occurred to me, that so many of my recent Christmases and I'm sure for so many, this Christmas, the joy is hard to come by. Sure I may have joy down in my heart, but it's pretty deep down there and it's covered by a lot of junk the world has thrown at me.

So how can this whole joy thing be real for so many when joy seems so deeply buried under lots of hurt and pain? I can't speak for others, but I know that a couple years ago, I was just done acting like I was good, things were okay, and I was happy about Christmas. It was Christmas Eve and my joy had gone out the window about a week prior as our new bathroom renovation was all for naught and the tub started leaking again through the roof of our living room. I was frustrated because we had seemed to make a number of financial mistakes that year and this was just another point showing how we didn't get what we paid for. Add to that some post-partum depression and it was just the perfect storm at Christmas time.

Brad and I usually lead the Christmas Eve service together, but the thought of doing that on this Christmas Eve when everything had gone wrong, felt like the most fake thing I could do. I didn't even want to show up and pretend things were fine when they weren't. So I called him with about 10 minutes to go before service and told him I couldn't do it. I wasn't going to show up and answer "Fine" when everyone asked "how are you?".  This is what this whole holiday season feels like for so many. While some find it joyful, for those that don't, it's almost worse because you feel guilty for not being entranced by the "magic of the season".

And then there's this week of Advent, the week of joy. Joy means, "A feeling of great pleasure and happiness" but that wasn't me that Christmas. There wasn't a lot that gave me any kind of happiness. What kind of person can't even enjoy this holiday through their child's eyes? No one really had a good answer to that. To make it worse, I was the pastor's wife and with that comes some pressure (whether self-imposed or just unspoken) to have it together.  Unfortunately for this pastor's wife, I'm completely and utterly human. That means that depression and anxiety and awful things happening in life don't pass me up for someone else. Christmas was sad that year, I was sad that year.

I have a few years between me and that Christmas, and I realized that trying to be perfect and act like everything was perfect was sucking the little bit of joy there was out of Christmas.  Advent is this time of waiting for the big thing to happen. After all, Jesus is coming, but waiting is hard. I can give you several examples using my children as the subjects to demonstrate that waiting even for a short time is excruciating. And if we are waiting on joy, the wait can be more painful as each day passes.

Maybe that's why we have to celebrate hope and peace before we can get to joy. Because I don't think we can have true joy before we have hope and peace. When I look back at that bad Christmas, I see that hope and peace were absent. But one day a few months later hope began creeping back in, mainly in the form of people who loved me well. They were the messengers of hope and peace. It started with little laughs, a chance to help them out sometime and getting some thanks in return, and really just choosing to get out of bed some days.

This is why I'm no longer so into the perfect Christmas season. Instead, I feel a great call to be more than a representative of Pinterest perfection. I'd rather people see a little rough edge than a perfectly shiny exterior, because maybe then someone can feel that they aren't in this alone. The joy is yet to come. It's there deep in us, and it will resurface. After all, God's greatest joy didn't show up in any way anyone would have predicted. It was a teenage mother who didn't have a husband and gave birth surrounded by animals because there was no where else to go. Not the most ideal circumstances by far. And that's when joy has a chance, because gloom and doom are so quick to shut out the happiness, it makes experiencing true joy again so much better. Sometimes just showing up to face this holiday without holding ourselves to the ideals of what we should be feeling and just allowing ourselves to feel all the feelings, gives us permission to find joy...even if it's just a little.  Because the truth is, the joy comes in the morning, it just may take a few wake-ups before we get a chance to experience it!

The Glow

Every Christmas, Brad writes a poem for the Christmas Eve service. He's usually quick to write them, as that is one of his many talents. Last year he was struggling and I just had a lot on my heart so I wrote a poem. He found his inspiration, but sweetly said he had read this and thought it was good. I'm sharing it this year, because Advent seems so much more important to me lately. I need to be reminded that we are in a waiting period and that this time is meant for reflection and growth. I hope some of you will find your Hope, Peace, Love, and Joy this season!

The Glow

A baby born 2000 years ago

And angels illuminated the sky

The Glow shown round the hilltops

To shepherds watching nearby

Darkness falls around us

The winter time has come

Yet God’s plan lights the path

And Jesus is the ONE

But burdens we all bare

Make a raging fire, dim

We cannot see the glory

We can barely picture HIM

That baby born in Bethlehem

So removed from you and me

The glow of a star doesn’t shine on us

This isn’t how it is suppose to be

But reminders are all around us

God sent his son to save

We don’t deserve it, never earned it

Our victory o’er the grave

The Glow doesn’t always appear

When we are feeling down and out

It doesn’t fill us with joy

If life has taken a different route

But God’s glow doesn’t wane

It’s here for us today

Pulling us back to Bethlehem

The very Christmas day

Sometimes fires fade

And darkness is all around

But God’s glow continues, it’s steady

Ready to be found

It’s a fire in the hearth

Keeping all around it warm

It’s a place for homeless men

To shelter them from a storm

It’s children’s eyes as they see new things

Wonderment and awe

It’s beating cancer

A journey that seemed so far

The glow waxes and wanes

But it’s always there to see

God’s perfect Christmas gift

Who died on Calvary

Jesus wasn’t given

As a check off Christmas list

He was given just for us

For a time such as this

So that glow may be different

For all of us right now

God’s giving you a gift

Where shepherds came to bow

That tiny little baby

Brought into the world one night

He is the glow

Heaven’s One True Light

So as you celebrate

Or wonder about it all

Remember that God’s glow

Reversed the dreaded fall

That special Christmas gift

Was born for those who seek

Those who needed saving

The poor, the lame, the meek

He came for all of us

It’s important that you know

Jesus is the way, the truth

The reason for a glow!