God Save Our Bathroom!

By Bob Kaku

Two years after we moved into our newly constructed home, we noticed hairline cracks forming in the tiles of our master bathroom­—all over the floor, shower walls, bath skirt, and even on top of the vanity counter. It looked like someone took a piece of chalk and drew lines on the tiles. The longest crack measured four feet and ran across multiple tiles. Where did these cracks come from?

“Lord, help! What’s happening to our bathroom?” my wife, Gail wailed.

I called the builder, and he came over to examine the problem. He squatted down toward the bath skirt and ran his finger over the crevices. “I think the problem is in the marble,” he said with a puzzled expression. “I’ll get back to you.” But we never heard back from him.

“It looks like we’re stuck since we didn’t extend the home warranty,” Gail lamented. “Who would have ever thought a new house would have such problems!”

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Christmas Card Friendships

By Kathy Willis

Today I worked on writing notes in Christmas cards for our Sunday school class. Each one gets a special note, so it takes a while. I took a break and went to the mailbox to look for season’s greetings from my loved ones. If I’m being honest, I divide these greetings into 4 categories.

#1-Cards with preprinted names.

#2-Cards with signed names.

#3-Form letter looking back over the year.

#4-A personal note from the sender.

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Wait Not Want

By Cheri Cowell

I’m terrible at waiting. Some people seem to possess a wonderful abundance of patience, but I’m not one of those people. Others who know me say I have a lot of patience and I’m good at waiting, but they don’t know what is going on inside. Inside I’m pacing, I’m making to-do lists, I’m thinking through all the possibilities, and I’m agitated. I’m not patient. I’m not waiting, I’m wanting. I’m wanting for the event to start, the situation to improve, or the circumstance to change. What is the difference, you ask? When I am truly waiting I have a peace about me that says I know the event, situation, or circumstance is a done deal. It is going to happen and I don’t need to fret or worry. There isn’t anything I can or need to do but wait. It says that I am not in control, but have submitted that authority to Someone bigger and better able to handle it than me. When I want, I feel I have control, and therefore, all the responsibility. Advent is a time to wait.

John says it so clearly: When Christ was born; True Light came into the world. That scene has been completed and is completed in us again every Christmas. Advent is our time to wait on the Lord, knowing full well that the gift will arrive on time. 

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Trimming Traditions

By Emily Chase

Celebration of Christmas demands that we maintain certain family traditions year after year. Some traditions satisfy the desires of eager children, while others protect exhausted parents. Here are five easy suggestions for trimming those traditions to fit the current season.

Decorating the house is the first challenge of the season. Stores begin decorating their shelves before Halloween so why not follow their example and get an early start? Combine Halloween costumes with Christmas themes and have your kids dress up as a Christmas wreath or an oversized Christmas stocking. When they come home, just have them hang the costume on the front door or over the fireplace mantel. Your neighbors have helpfully filled the stocking with candy treats so you can cross that chore off your list too.

Have you accumulated a mountain of cardboard cutouts covered with macaroni and glitter that your kids made in preschool? Your children are now in high school, and your family tree is beginning to look like more a bulletin board covered with post it notes. Start a new tradition. Recycle those ornaments! Have your children write notes on the back and send them to their former teachers as greeting cards. Think of the joy the teachers will experience knowing the child that emptied the entire bottle of glitter into the fruit punch still remembers them.

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Dreaming

By Cheri Cowell

Every mother and father looks on his or her infant child and wonders what magnificent things he or she will do. Will they become President of the United States or solve some incurable disease? Will they lead a revolution like Martin Luther King, Jr. or serve multitudes in selfless love like Mother Teresa? A new baby comes with new dreams not only for that child but also for the parents who will touch thousands more than they ever could with just their own lives. God had big dreams for the people of this world. He knew that in order to truly fulfill the dreams He has for each of us, He needed to send His Son to fulfill another dream—a dream that goes beyond what we sometimes think of when we remember the life of Christ.

In the book of Isaiah, the prophet speaks the very dreams from the heart of God. These are the dreams of a parent—a parent who is not only dreaming for His Son, but for you and me. Isaiah wrote these words 700 years before Christ was born. For 700 years God waited expectantly for just the right time. He carried these dreams in His heart and waited. Sometimes, when we think our waiting will never end, we need to remember God always waits for perfect timing.

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