A Christmas Story Retold

 

A tin of cookies. That’s how this story started out. My dear sister dropped by my office with a special delivery. Inside the smiling snowman can was a sampling of each of her homemade Christmas cookies, complete with teabag.

In my quest to savor each kind, I decided not only to try and identify it, but describe it with the very first Christmas story in mind.

Here’s what I discovered…

1)     Chocolate Chip.

Here is the classic, crisp, chocolate delight that I love. It’s my go to. The favorite. The popular. It’s the first that I chose and when I thought about its popularity, I remembered Mary and Joseph on that night, where popularity reigned in a tiny town. So much so, there was no room at the Inn.

2)     Ginger Molasses.

This deep amber beauty has a distinct spice. Fragrant aroma. An exotic quality that reminded me of those that traveled from lands afar. The Magi. 

3)     Peanut Butter.

A mild sweetness rings through, but what strikes me about this cookie is its sand-like dunes of texture and pattern. The weave of the top design like a basket or straw. Reminiscent of a manger scene.  

4)     Chocolate Drop.

There was a comfort with this dense morsel and a surprise with its white dusting of powdered sugar. My mind flashed to shepherds in fields comforting nervous lambs and their deep, sudden surprise of a host of angels. Snowy against a dark sky.

5)     Choco-Crumb Bar.

This small treat was a perfect square. A chocolate chip, caramel, oatmeal-blend square of a package. A gift filled with richness. Much like other gifts that night. Gold. Frankincense. Myrrh.

6)     Sand Tart.

This thin cookie shaped into a tall tree decorated with deep green. Cedar trees of Lebanon came to mind. Tallest of the tall I was thinking and then remembered the star that night. Empire state tall. Suspended in the sky.

7)     Chocolate Cherry.

Dark icing enveloped a jewel of a cherry inside. Sweetness nestled within sweetness. Much like the babe Mary cradled. Where holy was brought forth by human. Mary the Mother.  

8)     Oatmeal Raisin.

No flash. No sprinkles. No chocolate or exotic spice. A cookie of heartiness and substance. Like Joseph. Husband, carpenter, earthly father.   

9)     Sugar Cookie.

Bright sugar crystals covered this sweet light dough. Simple. Sugar and spice and everything nice. Still just a baby and a simple plan to save the world.

Thank you, sister -- for my sweet gift that offered sweet reflections during an Advent season.

Decking the Halls

The King is coming. The King is coming. 

Can you imagine if someone told you a king was coming to your house for dinner? Oh, the dust bunnies would quiver in their hiding places. What would you serve? Quail and pomegranate. What crimson carpet would you unfurl at your front steps? Movie star welcome. 

I LOVE decorating for Christmas. Each year, I delight in the puzzle to re-purpose all of my supplies into a new spectacle for the eyes. A visual feast. I start from scratch each year. I'll spend two hours ornamenting a garland that I will dismantle in 10 minutes come January. 

As I drove home last night in the early darkness, I thought about my decorations. The sugar-crusted faux fruit and iridescent balls. Magenta. Flame orange. Peacock green. Beauty revealed but once a year and I remembered that I was decorating for a king. A king who doesn't need grandeur, but infinitely deserving of it. The King. 

Blessed

The youth of the church gathered a few months ago to lead the worship service. It was the close of summer and nervous teens took turns climbing alter steps to offer up their testimonies about recent mission trips. They stood small behind the carved lectern. Hesitant, but committed. A trickling, then torrent, of verbs and adjectives poured forth of their experiences. Laughter bubbled from the audience at times and humbled silence followed at others. These students realized that through seeing others' pain and need, did they understand what it meant to be blessed in their own lives. 

The stories ended. Slowly, each teen navigated through the maze of dark pews. Acoustic guitar music surrounded them as each song line repeated, "We were blessed...We were blessed..." One after the other came forward again. Shoulders lined shoulders to stand on the alter and raise a handmade sign branded with that common word. Blessed. Blessed. Blessed. I was moved. Literally. I scrambled from my rear seat in the dark cavern sanctuary. My husband edged me on, "Go, Honey, go." I knew he felt it too. Front and center, I clicked photos from my camera phone. It was too powerful a moment not to capture.  

While school peers may have chosen music camp or sports camp, these rare few chose mission camp. Awkward, nervous, shy, bold, pimpled, beautiful.  To see the love of our Lord surge forth in a generation often labeled as adversary, we were blessed for having witnessed it. Blessed.   

Incognito

"We may ignore, but we can nowhere evade, the presence of God. The world is crowded with Him. He walks everywhere incognito. And the incognito is not always hard to penetrate. The real labour is to remember, to attend. In fact, to come awake. Still more, to remain awake." - from Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer by C.S. Lewis

Incognito. The birds' chatter concerto. The perfect flight of an arrow. A smiling, bubble-foamed baby swirling round the bathtub. Seemingly painted legs of a hopping grass eater.

Can we recognize the incognito? Discern it among the ocean of noise that floods our days?

More so, if we can find God in the beauty, can we find Him in the burden? The life-application notes of my Bible explain to me, "God does not keep us from encountering life's storms, but he will see us through them. In fact, God walks through these storms with us and rescues us." Can we pause between the rain drops and lightning bolts to seek our rescuer, to cry out before the incognito and awake? I wonder.

Yummy Mummies

Chocolate cupcakes.
Strips of vanilla icing.
Candy dot eyes.
Black gel icing for pupil center.

The only cupcake paper liners I had were for Valentine's Day. Covered in fuchsia hearts. Why not? Everyone should love their mummy.

Never Land

Never Land. An underground passage that escapes the tick of time. Crocodile hungry time, that wears on hearts and souls and bodies, etching grooves in cracks of skin, deep as canals. The Lost Boys are there and the Mermaids, too. That cast of unforgettable characters in life that make you forget the tick tock, tick tock, as chapter after chapter closes in the novel of life. The friends of mischief, the beauties of compassion, those you love in laughter and lamentations. Fold them close and find your way to Never Land.

September Saturday

Brown sunflowers. My favorite.
A toasted version of the golden child flower.

My son. A haystack guardian.