As we went around the table this morning, our annual tradition was in play. Everyone was answering the question, what are you thankful for? It’s officially that time of year. In the next 38 days we will eat more turkey, watch more football games, do more shopping, eat more chips, hopefully see more family and friends, celebrate Thanksgiving, our Lord’s birth, and usher in 2011! WOW!!! So how do we live the next 38 days in a way that when it’s over we aren’t wondering, what happened? If you live in America, in the next 38 days it will be nearly impossible to not get caught up in the craziness of the season. Might I suggest we need to take control of these 38 days and not let the 38 days control us? How do we do that? Over the next several days Kelli and I are going to post some blogs about taking control of the Christmas and holiday season. At the end of the day, there is no magic formula – like taking control of your weight, it’s a decision and a lot of discipline. Also like the ongoing battle of the bulge, we are swimming upstream; fighting the influence of the media, our culture, and in some cases even our Christian community.

 

Auntie Becca and Sina with their Thanksgiving creation!

So start by making a decision. If you are married, go out with your spouse on a date and make a decision. What do you want your family’s holiday season to look like. If you don’t, school schedules, bowl games, church functions, shopping trips, office parties, and life, will take over and you’ll wake up and look at the calendar and it will be 2011. Make some decisions about how you want your kids (and yourself for that matter) to remember Christmas of 2010. You know how Apple and X-box want you to remember this year – but how do you want to remember it? By the time you read this, you will probably have already enjoyed your Thanksgiving dinner, but what will your family remember about your time together. Was it filled with turkey? Or was it filled with family and friends and thanksgiving? If you happen to be a Breakpoint reader (Chuck Colson’s daily online resource) he talked today about the version our kids are getting of the pilgrim’s journey to the new world. I want my kids to remember why those people braved the treacherous waters and crossed the ocean. Jean Craighead George, in her book, The First Thanksgiving says the Pilgrims left Europe “to seek their fortune in the New World.” It makes for a great book, unfortunately according to the people that were actually there, it isn’t true.  I want to make sure my family knows how God was part of the first Thanksgiving. And do your kids know what Abraham Lincoln penned when he proclaimed the first official Thanksgiving day?

 

…No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged was with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens…

 

So begin this Christmas season by taking back the truth of what we are celebrating. I’m not suggesting to be militant “speak the truth in love” – but I am saying to ensure your family knows why they are celebrating what they are celebrating. Kelli and I wrote a book a couple of years back titled, “Going Public, Your Child Can Thrive in Public School”, so you know we aren’t afraid of authors like George or the stories our kids learn at school. We aren’t afraid because we (Kelli and I) are the most important teachers in our children’s lives. Don’t let this holiday season happen to you and to your family. Take control of it. In the Old Testament whenever God delivers his people by parting the Red Sea or defeating an opposing army or dropping the walls of a city, He would tell them to remember; to tell their kids about the great things God had done. In the same way we must remember. Make a decision to help your kids remember what God has done for His people. Tell God’s story in your home this Christmas season.