It is Christmas eve and I'm remembering. I'm reflecting on memories and traditions and change.
Growing up, Christmas equalled Family. EVERY Christmas (with the exception of one when we were snowed in in Colorado) until I was married, we spent Christmas eve with my dad's side of the family and Christmas day with my mom's parents. Christmas was family reunion time. Bingo, fried okra, ham, homemade rolls and buying craft ornaments the day after Christmas and making them for the next year. After I was married, things changed. Now it was every other Christmas with my family and the other with my in-laws (my other family) filled with Christmas Eve talent show and a birthday party for Jesus. Great fun! Memories and traditions are great and we miss them but new ones are good also.
I've been in Africa 7 years. Christmas no longer equals family to me. It can't because I am on the other side of the ocean. And family is not the reason for the season. Christmas is the celebration of the birth of my Savior. It's not that we didn't know that with family but in the mission field the realization hits you harder that so many don't really know that; don't really know Him! So now Christmas equals Christmas parties to me. Parties for children whom many haven't had the opportunity to celebrate Christmas in a party. They don't know that they are the child of the King of Kings! Many don't know that they are special and loved and cherished by God and by others. It is has been a unique new tradition that I have looked forward to each year.
As I am working through a book on reentering back to my home culture (next March), I know that next Christmas will not longer hold this tradition but will be the start of something new in some form or other. I will definitely miss the parties. My happy place is laughing, splashing and encouraging children to go on the water slide. My most touching moment was my first Christmas party in South Africa when Emoyeni had the children leave through a prayer tunnel where they prayed blessing over every child.
Change is not bad, it will bring new opportunities to love on others during this season and share the reason for His birth. And the parties in Africa will continue to bless children (even without me). So as my Christmas Eve comes to a close and I get ready to watch my favorite Christmas movie......It's A Wonderful Life, I decided to go through and post a few pictures from each year of parties. From the super colossal ones, to individual CarePoints in Swaziland, to the ones in South Africa. Enjoy and view with pleasure! It is not sad to look back and know it will never be that way again. Instead it is great to recognize what we have experienced and know that it has prepared us to be a part of a new experience in the future. Thank you Lord for the memories!
2008 (No pictures from 2007)
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2009 (Individual CarePoints)
2011
2012 Swaziland and South Africa
2013 South Africa
The hands you see below sticking out of the bubbles is me attempting to go down the water slide at the very end of the party at Mangwaneni (my CarePoint for 5 1/2 years in Swaziland) with a little help from my friend. It was my baptism so to speak of starting to say goodbye to Africa.
(At least for now.)
FOR UNTO US A CHILD IS BORN!!!
Take time this season to love well on family, friends and strangers and share how much God has blessed you! I am grateful for how He has blessed me! And I am thankful that He was willing to leave heaven and be born on earth just for me and for each one of us!
I will miss Africa in a huge way but I trust the One who is starting me down a brand new path. I will rejoice in the opportunities to love that I have had here. I will smile and laugh remembering all the people I have been blessed to work alongside, the exhaustion from the Christmas parties and the joy and excitement of the children. And I will look forward to the adventures even in ordinary routines that lie ahead.
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!
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