The Reason for the Season

I had fun on Saturday afternoon putting up my Christmas tree alone with Michael Buble' playing away in the background.  The Man of the House who will subsequently will be referred to as Moth wasn't keen to thread ribbon through a tree.  Anyway I came across some little red apples and tartan ribbon while sifting through the baubles and had a moment of nostalgia as I remembered that Christmas many years ago with two young children at the time and not a lot of decorating budget I clad the tree from top to toe with the little red apples (about 20 for $1) and tartan ribbon bows (the wooden duck on the coffee table also got a bow).

 It made me realise how our situation has changed over the years and how I have changed also.  My taste has developed with age and the elegant tree I have now is a far cry from its cheap and cheerful but loved at the time cousin from years ago.

 I don't like a lot of the same things I liked years ago, or think the same about life as I did years ago, with age and the help of God's love in my own life I can try to accept that other people can change too and not hold things against them from a time when they may have been different than they are now.  Christmas is all about forgiveness, it is a good time to invite forgiveness into your life, forgiveness for those that have hurt you, forgiveness for yourself if you have hurt others and asking them to forgive you.    I realise that much of the change that has happened to me is because God's love has changed me, and I would hope you would allow Him to heal hurts in your life, but even if you have never had an encounter with the Reason for this Season, Jesus, forgiveness still works.  Harbouring things eats us up, forgiving releases us.  Some wrongs are really bad and hard to forget, but we can only do our bit, by letting the hurt go and leave it up to God to sort the other person out.  Have a wonderful day!