Perspective...

Perspective is a funny thing. It can cause us to broaden our outlook or it can narrow our ability to see things in ways other than what is relative to our momentary situation or circumstance. Perspective is like a pair of glasses. If you don’t have the right prescription your vision is impaired.

During the time that the Israelites had been taken captive to Babylon the Lord brought to the prophet Jeremiah a vision. Following this vision, the Lord asked, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I paused at the end of this sentence. I started to look around asking myself, Tina, “What do you see?” At first glance I saw the obvious. Sitting in my living room, I first saw the Nativity scene displayed on my sofa table. Perusing over to the left I saw a candle. Then I glanced over at the Christmas tree and then to the clock on the wall. The words, “what do you see” kept running through my mind, as I found myself again much more conscious of what I had just seen… the Christmas tree, the Nativity scene and the clock on the wall, etc. Then a funny thing happened. I started to see the same things but in a different light the more I looked at them. I began to look beyond what was actually there. As I looked again at the Nativity Scene hope started to fill my soul as I remembered the salvation I have in that little baby lying in the manger. The Old World style clock on the wall has been hanging there for eight years now and before then in my apartment. It was a gift from my father who passed away this past summer. It gave me a feeling of his touch on my life. As I looked at the Christmas tree I saw the Angels that decorated it and how they were handed down to me from my Mother who passed away just under three years before. Then I started to count the many blessings in my life that started to adorn my perspective at that moment.

This Christmas is guaranteed to be an emotional precedence for me and my family. The losses in our family this year have left a melancholy gap in the Holiday traditions we normally celebrate. The effect of losing a loved can be very profound and sometimes mysterious and how each of us grieves that loss can be very personal. Holidays of course always seem to prompt a more sentimental visit down memory lane.

But that’s not all…

My attention has been more intimately focused on the reason for why Christmas is even here. . I find myself more in tune with the gift that is always, no matter what, under everyone’s Christmas tree every Christmas morning…the gift of Heaven. That brings such hope! Such a light in an ever increasingly dark world.
I begin to find an amazing comfort in knowing that someday I will be with my loved ones again…celebrating Christmas.