We have lots of pictures to post and had a beautiful Christmas. Hopefully I will get them on here before 2011 ;) As I "take down Christmas" and it's bittersweet doing so, I remember I can choose to keep it all year...thanks Jim for this...thought it was good to pass along!
Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people and to remember what other people have done for you? To ignore what the world owes you and to think what you owe the world. To put your rights in the background, your duties in the middle distance and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground. To see that your fellowmen are just as real as you are and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy. To know that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life but what you are going to give to life. To close your book of complaints against the management of the universe and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness...are you willing to do these things even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas.
Are you willing to stoop down and consider the needs and the desires of little children, remember the weakness and loneliness of people who are growing old, stop asking how much your firneds love you, and ask yourself whether you love them enough? To keep in mind the things that other people have to bear on their hearts. To try to understand what those who live in the same house with you really want without waiting for them to tell you. To trim your lamp so that it will give more light and less smoke and carry it in front of you so that your shadow will fall behind you. To make a grave for your ugly thoughts and garden for your kindly feelings with the gate always opened...are you willing to do these things even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas.
Are you willing to believe that love is the strongest thing in the world?...stronger than hate, stronger than evil, even stronger than death and that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem two thousand years ago is the image and brightness of the Eternal Love? Then you can keep Christmas.
And if you keep it for a day, why not ALWAYS? But, you can never keep it alone.
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good stuff.. I am going to use this. thanks for sharing! I would say you had some amazing blessings in 2009.. but here is to more and more in the coming year =)
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