Christmas hamper, a family in need

A Christmas hamper - a collective collection for a family or individual in need during the Christmas season to help carry them through. As noted in a previous post (see here), my family has been working with little leading up to this holiday season. With the kids getting older but yet still very young, it became a point of figuring out how to help them understand the balancing act of living a simple lifestyle as a choice versus living frugally due to circumstances of life. This will be the second holiday season in which the kids will be experiencing this. And here is where the blessing comes in. We have been blessed to be living in a community that cares and loves each other in a very neighborly fashion, where neighbors care for and are concerned for the wellbeing of other families. In essence, they believe a neighborhood is more than just a place to live but a village of families supporting each other.

This community of families, after finding out that my family will be making this hard choice once again this holiday season, decided to band together and do a Christmas hamper drive for us. They wanted the kids to be able to have gifts under the tree. They wanted us to have enough resources to have a family Christmas dinner. They wanted us to be able to spend time as a couple and have a date night. This is a community of families and neighbors that decided on their own that they wanted to bless us in this season of blessing. They wanted us to be able to experience a normalcy that was lost due to the circumstances of life.

I am very thankful for this community. I am very humbled by this gift and this help. Although we were pushed to making these difficult choices in life, we weren't pushed over the edge. Yet this community didn't want to see us over the edge before they helped, they wanted to be there while it was rough and wanted to walk alongside us to help us get back on our feet. I was humbled. For those of us that have had better days, we may be used to helping others. We too are used to being the ones to help give a hand to those in need. And often times, we don't realize it when we ourselves need help too. I was humbled by this experience and this quote from one of the organizers of the hamper.

"We can never be too proud to accept help. All of us need help at one time or another. Sometimes it is for us to help and sometimes it is for us to receive help. We have to be gracious in accepting help. What comes around will eventually go around. You may need a lift this year, but next year when things are better you will be able to give someone else a lift."

This sums up the holiday and Christmas spirit quite well. We have been blessed and gifted with so much in life and we are responsible to use what we have to bless others. And none of us are so above that we can't use a little help here and there in life.

In entering into the Christmas time, this humbling experience has helped me reflect on life. Reflect on the greater gift that was given to us, the gift of love, blessing and grace that came from God in the form of His Son Jesus. We were in trouble, and although not necessarily looking for or asking for help, He initiated and offered. And we can only accept humbly and graciously this gift given to us and be thankful.

I am thankful for this community in which I live. I am thankful for those who have rallied around my family to support us through this season. And I am ultimately thankful for the hope that God gave us and continually reminds us of in the events, remembrance and celebration of Christmas.

So step back a little. If you have extra, use it to bless someone else. And if you are in need, be willing to receive help. It is there.

 

Entering into the holiday season with little

A few months back, I wrote about a mom detailing her emotional pain of not being able to give to her daughter the things the little one has asked for due to the financial situation the family was experiencing at the moment (Read it HERE.) Little did I know that my family would be in a similar situation come this Christmas season. Over the course of this year, my wife and I have experienced a number of job changes and job loss and with this in mind, we are in a season of financial constraint, with neither of us officially working for a pay cheque.

For sure, there could be worse situations in life. And to be honest, despite the tightness of finance, we are still relatively positive in being able to find something before our finances become critical and run dry. And I am fully aware of families in situations that are worse off than we are. And here is the reflection that I have, we take so much for granted but life is not something we can take for granted.

In being placed in this relatively uncomfortable position (read about my thought of being in a state of discomfort HERE) of constraint during a season characterized by consumerism and entertainment, it is in itself a blessing and a curse. It's a curse in the fact that you feel you are not able to enjoy the holidays as much as people that are less constrained in their lifestyle. But it's a blessing in the fact that you are essentially sidelined from the consumeristic nature of the holiday season and are instead forced to focus on what the holiday is truly about.

Holidays for us now, with the material gifting and shopping taken away, along with some of the paid experiences being priced out of range, has become an intentional time of relationship and quiet reflection. When you are not able to compensate relationships with material, you are challenged to gift the gift of time and presence, a gift in its truest sense: priceless. You are challenged to reflect on what matters in your life, to reflect over the past year's experiences, relationships, and where life is heading in general.

For me, it truly is becoming a time of reflection. This is probably one of the first Christmases that I don't have to work the various Christmas services and events at my local church. The idea of the holidays and the Christmas season takes on a more pure meaning. It has become a time to reflect on the gift that was once given to us 2000 years ago in the form of a babe named Jesus. A gift of love and peace, a gift of salvation and reconciliation, a gift to which no other material gift can compare. And at the same time, in acknowledging this gift from God, I have come to challenge myself in reflecting how I have been a gift to other people.

Some of the questions that I have been asking myself recently:

1. Have I been present for my kids and family? In a fashion where I am willing to sacrifice and gift myself for them?


2. Have I been a gift for my friends, neighbors and acquaintances? How have I been serving them out of love with no expectations of gain or recognition?

We have been gifted so much in life but often times we don't realize how much we have been blessed until we truly are put in a position of little. And my challenge for all of us, including myself, is this:

Even with what little we have, or for some that have plenty, be willing to serve and be a gift to those around you this season in the measure that has been given to us by God.

This is what the Christmas spirit is about, whether we have much or little, we can give the gift of love.