One Christmas season I was bored with our family signing our names inside of our annual Christmas card, like we had done for decades.  So one year I wrote a poem and mailed it to family and friends.

The inspiration came from my love of sitting in our den late at night with all the lights off except for the Christmas tree.  It fosters a quiet peace vs. a hectic Christmas the world keeps selling. How do you worship the Christ of Christmas? Maybe it begins with turning off the lights…

“Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

Sit down, reflect on the memories.

Each one is hanging, some old some new,

which decoration means the most to you?

Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

Sit back and ponder the mystery.

God gave his greatest gift on a tree,

the life of Jesus given for you and for me.

Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

Get down and praise him upon your knees.

God gave his greatest gift on a tree,

the birth of Jesus born in humble majesty.

Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

Stand up and praise Him for reconciling you and me.

God gave his greatest gift on a tree,

The blood of Jesus innocently shed for you and me.

Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

Raise your arms to heaven for His grace given liberally.

God gave his greatest gift on a tree,

He is alive now, after bearing our sinful heredity.

Turn off the lights, except for the tree.

He’s coming back to take us home for eternity.

God gave his greatest gift on a tree,

The life of Jesus given for you and for me.

Turn off the lights”

Your Christmas tree and your family tree have deep significance.  How so? Why not let Ann Voskamp answer that question from The Greatest Gift.  “If you don’t come to Christmas through Christ’s family tree and you come into the Christmas story just at the Christmas tree–this is hard to understand, the meaning of His coming.  Because without the genealogy of Christ, the limbs of His past, the branches of His family, the love story of His heart that has been coming for you since before the beginning-how does Christmas and its tree stand?  Its roots would be sheared. Its meaning would be stunted.”

But maybe you’ve thought: “How can God work through my family tree of dysfunction?”  Voskamp continues, “The coming of Christ was right through the families of messed-up monarchs and battling brothers, through affairs and adultery and more than a feud or two, through skeletons in closets and cheaters at tables.”  

Voskamp sums it up, “The Gift who hung on a Tree for us, cut off.  The Gift who was pierced for you, wounded—your wounded, willing God, who unfolds Himself on the Tree as your endless, greatest Gift.”  

Tired of all the “Holiday Hoopla”?…Why not turn off the lights except for your tree?

pictures courtesy of “Nelson & his Nikon”