Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
I love to celebrate the birth of Jesus. I think Christmas is all over America giving, loving and caring. It is celebrating the love of Jesus. A thousand years have come and gone, but the birth of the Christ Child is in every believer’s heart. “For unto us a child is born and he will save the people from their sins.”
There is something about Christmas that brings cheer and joy. I just love Christmas. Don’t tell, but I put my Christmas tree up when it was Halloween. I love to smell the pine tree. When I look at the angel at the top of the tree I think of angels appearing to the shepherds. The lights remind me that Jesus is the light. He lights the path ahead of all of us. He also gives the world an abundant life and the blessed hope of eternal life.
The red poinsettia brings to my mind the blood of Jesus, who voluntarily allowed his blood to be shed for you and me.
I’m not calling Christmas a “Winter Holiday” Or “Happy Holidays.” I’m going to say “Merry Christmas!” If Jesus is taken out of Christmas, there’s nothing left to celebrate.
Many thoughts of Christmas return this time of year. Granny let me sleep on a pallet by the lighted Christmas tree. The aroma of turkey cooking along with apple pies made me happy. I woke up Christmas morning to find a little cedar chest just right for storing secrets. Echoes of Granddaddy’s laughter still linger in my mind. My little cedar chest had an orange, an apple and a peppermint cane in it. I thought I had everything!
There is something about Christmas that brings happiness. What could make us happier than knowing we are never alone? God is always there.
Home! The very word makes us joyful. To be home again, if only for a little while, just to hear the laughter, tasting Mom’s cooking and looking into the faces of those we love. Even the tearful good-byes are worth the precious times we have with family.
Dear reader, if you are facing your first Christmas without that loved one please know that one will be having his or her first Christmas with Jesus. I can almost hear angels singing “Halleluiah.”
“There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun for the Lord. God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.” (Revelation 22:5 NIV).
Portales resident Joan Clayton is a retired teacher and published author. Her e-mail address is:
