Tis The Season

Robin with the 'gaggle of children'

Tis the season.  We hear it over and over and over again during these weeks.  Tis the season to be jolly.  Tis the season to give.  Tis the season to make dreams come true.  Tis the season to be merry.   Tis the season to get together.  Tis the season, tis the season.  

I’ve been convicted this year more than ever that each and every day ‘tis the season.’  Christmas isn’t supposed to be celebrated just one day a year…it is to be celebrated each and every day.  It’s the reason we live – breath – and have our being.    

Christmas gives us hope, when our hope seems to have run out.  It gives us reason when there seems to be none.  It gives us determination just when we are ready to throw in the towel.  Christmas is the heartbeat of love and is vibrant around us, and when we submit to it, it’s even in us.  

I just finished visiting a very rural and poor area in Honduras.  It’s a place my husband and I happened upon a little over a year ago, one evening when driving home down a long winding dirt road, passing a mother with two little babies, one in her arms, and the other by her side.  My husband stopped and told this mother to get in the vehicle, we’d take her home.  She lives miles down this dirt road in a little community at the end of nowhere.  Her home consists of blocks with a roof and a pavement foundation, nothing else.  No water, no electricity, no bathroom, no kitchen.  But, she has shelter, and she has her children.  That evening started a special friendship…one that mainly consisted of my husband and I helping her out.  We would frequent her at her home, and my husband would always comment on the need for a church in that community.  He even blogged about it once.   This woman has a close friend who lives near her who is also a single mother, and somehow they ended up being a package deal.  

It was months after my husband’s death, and I had not been to visit these two families.  One day I heard voices outside my window, and when I looked up, there were the two mothers, traipsing up my dirt driveway with their gaggle of children. They did not come to ask for food, or help for that matter.  They came to hug me, cry with me, and let me know they heard the news, and they were so sorry this had happened.  They were in disbelief, as they said, “We don't understand why this would happen to someone so good to us.”  Then they asked if they could pray for me.  What?  These women that my husband and I had been ministering to now wanted to minister to me?  It was like our reason for living had been shown to me right then and there. 

You can imagine my delight when this last visit to their community a few days ago proved to be quite amazing.  One of those ladies now has a home church going on in her home!   

It’s when we don’t give up…when we keep on plugging along…when we keep loving even when we don’t feel like it…when we put others first…and when we don’t lose sight of His promises – that things really do change.  Tis the season each and every day.