It is true,
The older you get, the faster the days turn into years.
Christmas is once again on the doorstep,
But it seems, for me, it's not knocking quite a loudly as it has in the past.
Cairo, 19 degrees today and sunny,
The streets look the same as every other day, cleanly swept yet still dusty.
There are no decorations lining the street lamps, no tinsel in the store windows, no "Merry Christmas" sign shamelessly hung from the balconies.
The only lights that are hung are those that have yet to be taken down from Ramadan, but you know what, I'll take it.
Needless to say, Christmas just doesn't seem like Christmas this year.
Now I sit and reflect on that thought and it scares me,
What is Christmas without the decorations, the songs and the friends and family?
Why is it that without all the consumer nonsense, the fancy packages and the flashy lights, without jolly Saint Nick and the tree adorned with presents, why is it that Christmas feels like just another day?
As I walked to work the other day, I bumped into a familiar face,
My neighbours boab, greeted me with a smile and a Merry Christmas!
My first "Merry Christmas" of the year and it was said through broken English by a Muslim...
Did he truely know what it meant?
Probably not, but he knows I am a Christian and it's important to me.
His smile told it all.
I was so caught up in my first Christmas away from home, so caught up in having my host family and Joy (my girlfriend) head back to England, I was so caught up in what I was missing this Christmas, that I had forgotten what I do have.
Shameful really,
A day to remember the birth of Christ, our Savior, God incarnate and I've seemed to forgotten.
Christ was born in Bethlehem, The Son of God, to live as the ultimate role model, to teach us of the Father and His abundance of love and then in the end, demonstrate it to us, obedient to death on the cross.
Christmas is here again, and this year I'm going to focus of the truth, the reason.
I'm going to dig beneath the glitz and the glam and I'm going to find my Savior there.
Merry Christmas Everyone,
May God Bless you abundantly and may you and your families have a moment to reflect on the truth of Christmas.
Grace, Peace and Blessings From Cairo,
Brent
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1 comment:
Hi Brent - well, that one really hit home. Talk about a wake up call! You are so right, we are so busy missing what isn't happening for Christmas, or caught up in what we think we "should" do for Christmas, that we forget what we do have, all the time, without "doing" anything - Jesus. Thanks for the wake up call!!! Anyway, however your day is on Christmas Day, may it be joyous! I enjoy your blogs and keeping in touch with what's happening in your life. You're in my prayers - Sue (Leah's mom)
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