What Christmas is All About

This past Wednesday, one of Ashlyn's school assignments was to write in her journal about what Christmas is all about. This is what she wrote:

Do you know what moves me the most about this? It's the fact that she (without any prompting from me) clearly makes the connection of the cradle to the cross. I mean, she actually drew a manger scene in the corner (you can't see it that well on the scan, but it's there) but the main drawing is that of Jesus hanging on a cross, with the crosses of the thieves and even mourners standing beside.

Please understand that I'm not bragging on Ashlyn as much as I am praising God for working in my child's life to where she is making the connection that Christmas is really about our Savior--our Redeemer.

Every year I wrestle with the worldly view of Christmas--how to handle Santa, presents, and all of the things that have the potential to distract from the true meaning of Christmas. We have never taken drastic measures against those areas (i.e. we still buy gifts and we still leave cookies and milk on the fireplace), but we don't really push it either (well, we might tend to sometimes go a little bit overboard on the gifts). Still, we try to be intentional about teaching Jesus as the true meaning of Christmas and then pray that God will continue to work in their hearts (and ours) about how the Christmas story is really about our redemption from sin.

I think she covered it pretty well, don't you?