Learn Humility-Know Charity-Know Christ
During the Christmas season, decorating our homes with brilliant colors and lighted Christmas scenes / themes, baking and cooking, entertaining family and friends, singing Christmas Carols, sending Christmas greetings and gift giving are the traditional ways we celebrate. Excitement and love seems to be everywhere present.  Actually, Love is the fuel that ignites and spreads this excitement, because our Creator is Love, and by His grace, humanity has received a portion of this attribute. While it may seem that some have received a larger portion than others we should also be aware that God works His love in the hearts of those who do not even acknowledge Him.
The giving and receiving of gifts at Christmas time is one of our traditional ways of celebrating Christ's birth, but giving throughout the year to those in need is also an expression of God's love, for we meet Christ at both ends of the spectrum. For most, it is easier to see Christ in the giving, but Scripture reveals that Christ is also in the receiving.
Mat 25:40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as, ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
As Christians we should know that we can give to God nothing that is not already His. In this Scripture we can see Christ in the Receiving. When we give to the least among us, we have given to Christ, but He provided that we may have it to offer. He is in the Giving and the Receiving. While we cannot give Him anything that is not already His, we may withhold from Christ the things to which He is so rightly entitled; our will, our hearts and ourselves.

Beautifully said. Thank you.

Thank you for the Christmas greeting as well.

Happy New Year. I hope that the next year will be wonderful for you.

This may show up twice, but it didn't show for me the first time.

Thank you for the Christmas greetings. Happy New Year and I hope that the next year is full of blessing for you.

Shelli, you are very welcome and Happy New Year to you. May you and your family be blessed with the very best the new year has to offer. Also, I wanted to let you know that we will be praying for a safe and productive trip for you, Dave and the rest of your missionary group to Central America. You may be able to post to your journal from there once in awhile so we can "keep up."
Your comments did not appear immediately, because I have to approve them first. I was getting heavily spammed by "McDonald's" and "Harry Potter" as well as a many others. It is much easier to review them in advance than to delete hundreds of unwanted posts after they have posted. Also, I have started using the verify feature and that has eleminated some of the unwanted postings.
May the Lord bless and keep you safe.

Hello Jerry! I had been looking to see if there were new posts, but didn't check the comments.

Thank you for your prayer for our trip. We leave Friday morning and the trip is funded, we have all the supplies, I haven't heard that anyone has gotten ill, so the prayers are doing it!

I am not allowed to call or get on the net as far as I know until we get back. If I am able to, I'll post from there.

God Bless you too!!