NICE WORK, SANTA (Christmas Collection)

Four kids between the two of us made Christmas morning a complicated equation. 

My sister-in-law, Mary, and I coordinated the cousins’ gift lists across 1,200 miles for weeks. But the sum of our efforts wasn’t revealed until midnight Christmas Eve.

“One, two, three, four, five.” I counted the number of gifts in each stack with a precise finger, then did it thrice.

On the fourth count, “One, two, three, four, five, six.” An alarm sounded.

“SIX?!” I looked at Mary in horror. How could we fall so short of delivering the glorious message of Christmas? If we didn’t fix the inequity, someone would get hurt.

Should we buy more gifts? Pile on the tinsel? That’s how the world tells us to make up the difference.

But the true meaning of Christmas isn’t found in more. The glory of Christmas lies within us. 

Mary quickly grabbed the offending gift that would have caused strife and tucked it into a nearby stocking.

“Nice work, Santa.” 

With a click of our mugs, we toasted to a wrong made right in our little corner of the world.

It wasn’t Christmas magic; it was doing the holy work of reconciliation that the Christ child began when He left Heaven’s glory to dwell in human flesh. His blood sacrifice made up the impossible difference between sinful humanity and a Holy God. 

When you receive the Christ child, God’s glory dwells in you.

“Christ is in you, the hope of glory.” (Colossians 1:27)

You might masquerade as Santa or an elf, a mother or aunt, a daddy or an uncle, but every Christian is a minister of reconciliation.

“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation:” (2 Corinthians 5:18)

When you right the little wrongs around you, others will see God’s glorious light.

Let Jesus shine through you this Christmas and all year round.

Trim the tree. Mend the fence. Love the lonely. Keep the peace. Hug the hopeless. Then, sing for joy. 

Soon, God's glory will transform your little corner of the world and everyone in it.

Dozens of cookies and hundreds of dollars will never add up to the riches of Christ’s glory that lives in you.

Nice work, Santa. Keep shining.

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WAITING ON JOY (Christmas Collection)

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SERVE CHRIST THIS HOLIDAY (Christmas Collection)