Asherel was fulfilling a family tradition and lay sick on the couch with a cold coming on. I was always sick on christmas. She watched as I turned on the christmas lights and then placed battery operated tea light candles in the centerpiece, nestled into the real candle. To her horror, I turned it on.
"That Looks fake," she said.
"It Is fake," I told her.
"You Should just light the real candle."
"It doesn't stay lit,and besides,these fake candles won't burn down the house. "
I stepped back.
"From Far away it looks real."
She shrugged, not feeling well enough to argue.
But I paused to consider all the fake aspects of christmas - fake trees, fake garlands,fake reindeer, fake Santas....no wonder we often lose sight of what christmas is all about!
When the beloved ones bustled in, they didn't notice that the candles were fake. Noone was looking at candles real or otherwise. We were just happily holding close the dear ones we had missed so much.
Rummaging through old scrapbooks the week before, I had found a score of music my then 6 year old Anders had written. He had called it "Love is all you need." One line said,"big or small. Love is the greatest gift of all."
As I hugged my precious son and his exquisitely wonderful bride to be, I could not have agreed more with the sentiment of that line. And love is the one thing about christmas that should never be fake. As I snuffed out (eg- turned off the switch) of the fake candle, I glanced at the little clay creche Asherel had made me last christmas. Fake angels surrounded my little fake creche but somehow, it filled me with an emotion that felt suspiciously real, suspiciously like hope and faith, and unquenchable love.
2 Corinthians 9:15
Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift
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