I read this last night from Laines Letters. she was going through her grandmothers scrapbook of clippings she had saved and compiled them for her readers. This was one of my favorites and I thought some of you might enjoy it.

It's His Birthday (no author given)

I suppose I must call it the road of progress. Invention after invention, engine after engine. Life more mechanical, less human. Automobiles, radios, telephones, country clubs -- people drifting farther and farther from the simple things. Love and contentment! (My great grandmother underlined those two words.) Well, we're fond of one another, of course, but life is so complicated, so diversified --scattered --what is the word? And contentment? Is anybody contented now?

As for Christmas, it flashes on us first in the advertisements of the stores. Then the grand orgy of shopping, the madness of spending. My little grandchild -- he's south with his parents -- I wish you could have seen him. He summed it all up last year -- and he was only five at the time. His mother took him into a big department store, and he paused in an aisle and said in a high, clear voice: "Why do they have so many Santa Clauses? Why don't they have pictures of Christ? It's His birthday, isn't it, mother?"

Every year my family ask me over and over: "What do you want for Christmas?" And I never tell them what I really want. I want to go back. Like half of the men in America, I'm heartsick for the old-fashioned things -- old-fashioned music, old-fashioned flowers, old-fashioned children. And old-fashioned Christmas with everybody human again. Old-fashioned love and contentment.

One this one day at least we might pause for a moment in our wild dash down the road of progress. We might even go back a little way along the road that leads to Bethlehem. Put up the care, silence the phonograph, cut off the telephone. Savor for a moment, if we can, the simple things. Not so much jazz, and no more carols. Not so much a thought of price tags. A lot less of Santa Claus, and a lot more about Christ. For, after all, it is His birthday. *********************

God bless you!

Love, Laine

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-- Melissa (me@home.net), December 26, 2001