The Perfect Christmas

It's Christmas Eve.

In my perfect world, all of the presents have been purchased. All are gaily wrapped in bright paper with streaming bows, and set beneath the towering, perfectly decorated tree. The house is, of course, spotless. It smells of fresh-baked cookies, hot chocolate and peppermint. Christmas is evident throughout my home in the perfectly-placed decorations, up to and including the towels in the bathroom. The outside of my home tastefully declares the season in its perfectly strung lights which outline the structures, and in the lights which declare the "Reason for the Season" as lighted reindeer peacefully graze on the lawn.

The perfect Santa will come down my chimney tonight. He will be dressed in perfectly clean red velvet trimmed in white ermine. There will be no jingle bells on my Santa; no plaid shirt, no gold trim. This is MY Santa, and he is perfect.

Snow is falling in my perfect world. Loads and loads of snow. Enough to impede driving just a bit, and enough to come up past your knees if you walk in my perfect yard. Of course, you aren't allowed to do that, because it would mess up my perfect, snow-laden landscape.

My family will dress in perfect Christmas finery as we head out the door to our perfect church this evening. We will sing carols along the way there, then enter with flushed faces and sit to listen with rapt attention as the preacher once again tells of the perfect Christmas. Perfect organ music plays as the candlelight provides the only means of illumination. The church, with its perfect stained-glass windows, is laden with fresh pine boughs and holly. The smells of candles and pine mix together to form a heavenly scent which only adds to the holiness of the occasion.

After the service we will travel home to dine on standing rib roast, fresh vegetables and holiday goodies at our perfect dining room table. We will enjoy pleasant conversation, enhanced by the candlelight and warmth of our home. At midnight the children will be allowed to open one gift of our choice. It will be a pair of warm, flannel pajamas, and my children will thank us profusely for such wondrous gifts as these. After enjoying cookies and hot chocolate, they will brush their teeth and head off to bed to dream of the next morning.

This is my perfect Christmas Eve. (insert smiles and sighs of wonder here)

Then there's reality.

Today is Christmas Eve.

We still have at least four presents to buy before the stores close. The children have been wrapping gifts in a forced-child-labor sort of way, so we're not really picky as to how they look. Consequently, we're happy if (a) paper covers all visible areas of the gift, and (b) all of the paper covering the gift matches. As long as it isn't applied with super glue, we figure we're home free.

Presents will be placed under the haphazardly decorated tree, accomplished by more child labor. We were proud to even get the tree up at least two weeks before Christmas, and we'll be prouder still to burn it immediately following Christmas. It has a bit of a starboard list to it at the moment, but that won't affect its ability to infect us with Christmas cheer. It makes it all the more lovable.

The house is a mess, but that's only normal. The door decoration and the lone Santa on the front porch are the only signs that we actually know Christmas is on the way. Since it was somewhere around 56 degrees in the shade today, snow is a laughable thought. Church services were held tonight, but we were too engrossed in final preparations to attend. Instead, we had our own little service before sitting down to a dinner of tough, dried-out roast, frozen vegetables and leftover cookies from the baking I did earlier in the week.

The children may or may not open a gift before they go to bed. To be honest, there just aren't that many gifts under the tree this year, and to open one would mean less for them to open tomorrow morning. In lieu of gifts, Hubster and I will be giving each other a warm handshake and a hearty pat on the back.

But guess what? Our Christmas will still be perfect.

Because it isn't about all of the things above.

It's about love.

The love that God had for us when He sent His Son to this earth. The love we have for our children. The love our family has for each other. The love we show to others.

It's about love.

And that's the perfect way to celebrate the perfect Christmas.

With love.

1 John 4:7-12
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. (NIV)

Merry Christmas, with love, from the whole Singer family!