Livin' it up!
I think that this year's Christmas was perhaps the closest I've ever come to a truly worshipful Christmas. Without family around and the only social contact of the day coming in the evening, I was just hanging out with and loving the heck out of Jesus. It was so cool! I realized Saturday more than ever that when I am at my best, I am a true Christian hedonist. Did I enjoy a bountiful feast of great food and drink? I sure did. But the whole time, it was as if I was at table with Jesus and honoring Him. I felt like I was at a dinner honoring a certain admirable person's achievement. More accurately, it was like a welcome home banquet for the long ("and still", one could say) expected return of one who is dearly loved.
As each sip of full-bodied cabernet washed down delightful food, I thought about how Jesus said He came so that we might have life and live it abundantly. Well, I believe if ever there was life abundant, this was it. Abundant because of food and drink? Not entirely, no. But my freedom to enjoy such pleasures as seen through the lens of one who knows that as magnificent as they are (and oh how magnificent they are!), they are insignificant to the pleasures of God. It is a funny thing to enjoy life to the full knowing only full well that when life is departed, it will not be missed for those of us in Christ. For as much as my bacon and shrimp and pork chops (a menu, I should like to point out, would be two-thirds damnable had Jesus not appeared) satisfied a piece of me, I know that Jesus is more satisfactory now and will be infinitely moreso upon His return. Praise be to God!!!
That said, I do not wish to demean the great time I had hanging out with the Alberto clan, a household of joyful (for the most part) noise, a state that I suspect they've been accustomed to for quite awhile. I haven't seen a "big family" holiday in a long time and it was nice.
So offer me no pity that Christmas was spent away from "family". For although I was geographically separated from perhaps the most loved ones, I was not nor do I continue to be too far from true "home". God's peace.
Hasta
As each sip of full-bodied cabernet washed down delightful food, I thought about how Jesus said He came so that we might have life and live it abundantly. Well, I believe if ever there was life abundant, this was it. Abundant because of food and drink? Not entirely, no. But my freedom to enjoy such pleasures as seen through the lens of one who knows that as magnificent as they are (and oh how magnificent they are!), they are insignificant to the pleasures of God. It is a funny thing to enjoy life to the full knowing only full well that when life is departed, it will not be missed for those of us in Christ. For as much as my bacon and shrimp and pork chops (a menu, I should like to point out, would be two-thirds damnable had Jesus not appeared) satisfied a piece of me, I know that Jesus is more satisfactory now and will be infinitely moreso upon His return. Praise be to God!!!
That said, I do not wish to demean the great time I had hanging out with the Alberto clan, a household of joyful (for the most part) noise, a state that I suspect they've been accustomed to for quite awhile. I haven't seen a "big family" holiday in a long time and it was nice.
So offer me no pity that Christmas was spent away from "family". For although I was geographically separated from perhaps the most loved ones, I was not nor do I continue to be too far from true "home". God's peace.
Hasta