I love Christmas.  Truly, there isn’t one thing about it that I don’t love.  I remember as a child loving all of it as well.  Most of all, I loved the Christmas tree.  Every year I looked forward to going out to the local Christmas tree farm and cutting down our own, fresh Christmas tree.  It was so fun, running through all the trees, marking them with little bits and pieces of ribbon or paper cups, and searching for that ever elusive perfect tree.  Each year we found it, as if it were made for our family.

I have tried to keep the tradition alive for my children.  For the first couple of years, we took AA out to the same farm and did exactly as I had done.  As the years went on, the tress got more pricey, and the farm no longer had trees that you could cut yourself.  In recent years we have gone to local tree farms and simply picked out a pre-cut tree.  Not exactly the magic I remembered, but then again, my kids seem to be pretty happy so maybe it is more magical than I realize.

This year was an interesting year.  First off, the day we had set aside to pick out our tree, I woke up sick.  We had already promised the kids we were going to go, so despite not feeling my best, we did just that.

As we got to the farm, the kids started their frantic search for the perfect tree.  My goal is to find the biggest tree our house can hold.  Maybe it was the guilt of it not being the same as my childhood experience, but I was feeling the need to compensate.  Somewhere deep down inside me I felt like buying a bigger, more wonderful tree would somehow make up for the loss of tradition I had as a child.  Maybe the magic that was gained by my experience as a child, could somehow be transferred to my children by purchasing the most glorious tree I had ever laid eyes on.

Finally, I found it.  A huge tree standing somewhere over 8 feet tall.  It was glorious.  It was perfectly shaped, and the thickest tree I had ever laid eyes on.  This was the one.  This was the one to bring magic into our home.

Once we had made our purchase, that is where the magic stopped.  Brandon struggled to tie the tree to the roof of car, alone, since I was sick and am getting too pregnant to be much of a help.  Then came the task of bringing the enormous tree into our house.  Since it was such a thick tree, it needed a lot of trimming to make it fit in our space.  Brandon and I both ended up covered in sap.  Our kids couldn’t be much help, so they were often sent to “go play” while we tended to the needs of my “guilt offering”.

Next came bringing it into the house.  Fortunately, Brandon enlisted the help of our neighbor to help him bring it in.  Once it was squeezed through the door, there was another problem, the tree was too big for our stand.  Our stand which had worked wonderfully for many years, bent and buckled beneath the weight of the massive tree.  So, off Brandon went to find and purchase another stand.  He purchased the “heavy duty” stand for extra large Christmas trees.  After a few more minutes of fussing, we finally had the tree in the stand.  It appeared our dilemma had passed.  Our kids had been neglected our love an attention for the hours it took to get it into place, but finally the tree was where it should be.  It was lovely.

We spent the next evening happily decorating our tree.  We placed our tiny, delicate ornaments on its large branches.  By the time we were through, the tree was covered with our memories, from mementos from the kids first Christmas, all the way back to mementos from Brandon’s childhood.  Those ornaments are so precious to me, to all of us really.  They provide a road map of where we have been, and will certainly include much more, as the years go on and more milestones are passed.

All was wonderful, until the next day.  We were sitting on the couch enjoying a story as a family, when all the sudden… “CRASH”.  The tree, in all it’s glory fell over in our living room, leaving a path of broken, precious ornaments in it’s wake.  Thankfully, no one was hurt.

Granted, this isn’t the worst thing that could happen, it is simply a small set back in our Christmas spirit, but I couldn’t help but relate this Christmas tree to something I am guilty of doing in my Christian life, maybe you can relate as well.

My intentions were good.  I bought the tree with the intentions of providing a special memory for my children.  The problem is that MY good intentions, are not always God’s best.

I can’t help but wonder how often we do that as mothers?  How often do we allow guilt to motivate us to spend more, do more, be more?  How often do we simply go bigger, because we are trying to replace the magic we should be giving by our simple love and presence?

We search for the next thing to “want” for the benefit of ourselves or our children.  Whether it is something small, like a  new toy, or something huge, like a new house, bigger and better than what we have. Or maybe it is simply exhausting ourselves trying to be the “Queen of all things Christmas” (guilty!), cramming more and more into our already over-booked schedule in the name of memory making.

The problem isn’t that our intentions are bad, the problem is that God’s best does not always include bigger, better and more.  In fact, I would say it rarely does.

The problem with seeking to please our families with more and more “stuff”, each item bigger than the last, is that it never truly satisfies.  Each new “guilt offering” comes with strings attached.  New houses come with new, big mortgages.  With new toys come storage difficulties, clutter, and discontentment as we reach a heavy toy saturation.  It may even lead to discontentment with anything that isn’t new, shiny and plastic.  New “traditions” leave everyone too exhausted to breathe, too busy to even notice each other anymore.

The problem is that eventually our new “stuff” falls down, and with it, the things of real value are broken.

Not just precious ornaments.  Time with our children.  Time with our spouses.  The peace of simply being still with the Lord.  Smiles and gentle voices fade as we are faced with the added stress of serving our next new thing.

The answer to our guilt, is not a bigger tree, a bigger house, another tradition, or more “stuff”.  It is reliance on a bigger God.  It is asking Him to direct us, to guide us in creating the memories He wants us to make, and then praying that He fills in the gaps, because nothing, not even a bigger Christmas tree can fill the gaps that our Lord was made to fill.

Do you know what my children need from me this year?  They need me.  Not just any old me.  The me who serves my God whole-heartedly, who finds contentment in what the Lord has provided, and not the biggest Christmas tree on the lot.  They don’t need me to be the “Queen of Christmas” filling every corner of our schedule with some other “special” event.  No, they need me to be mommy.  The one who smiles.  The one who doesn’t tell them to just “go play” while she struggles with the stresses brought on by acquiring more, doing more.  They need the mommy who needs a big God.

Most of all, they need Christ.  If I am too busy sitting on the “Christmas Throne”, or struggling in my world of “one more thing”, I may just miss it.  They need Christ, and God has placed me on this earth to show them.

A bigger tree can’t do that.  Another tradition can’t do that.  Another house can’t do that.  No.

But a parent who is humbly submitted to the Lord and is seeking to serve Him, body, mind and soul, can do that.

Yes, they can do that.

So what did we do about my guilt offering?  We gave it away.  We gave it to someone who needs it.  In its place stands a modest artificial tree.  We don’t need another tradition, but we do need each other, and most of all we need our God.

Not so surprisingly, He doesn’t come attached to enormous 8 foot trees.