8th Day of Christmas with Renee Swope
Welcome Encouragement for Today devotion readers to our 5th annual 12 Days of Christmas giveaways!
But first, as promised in the Unhurried Christmas devotion (click here if you haven’t read it) here is the info for the free 5-day resource: From Chaos to Calm: The LET. IT. GO. Christmas Challenge:
Do you often have Norman Rockwell-like expectations about the holidays — the decorations, the food, the gifts, the activity — laden schedule, the family get-togethers?
There are many areas where women want to exert control ensuring the perfect yuletide season. What if we learned instead to let go of unrealistic expectations and embrace an “out-of-control” Christmas this year: relaxing and relating in a peaceful manner while letting others offer input and ultimately allowing God to call the shots?
Then join the 9000 women who have gotten my free 5-day resource From Chaos to Calm: The LET. IT. GO. Christmas Challenge?
This challenge will allow Christmas to go from chaos to calm as you learn to control what you should and trust God with what you can’t. The result? Less stressing and more blessing! Click here for the free sign up.
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Now, back to the 12 Days of Christmas giveaways.
Each day I’m featuring one of my Proverbs 31 sisters offering a recipe, idea or memory and giving away a prize for the day!
Today’s guest?
Our Proverbs 31 Executive Director of Radio and devotions, author, speaker and awesome friend:
She writes:
Christmas was only days away and we still didn’t have a tree. Living on a college-student’s budget with our first baby on the way, we were scraping by and couldn’t bring ourselves to spend $25-50 on something we didn’t need.
It seemed kind of trivial when I told God how sad I felt that we couldn’t afford a Christmas tree.
But that year, I discovered how much God cares about the longings of our hearts and, if we’re looking, He’ll show us His heart for us in them.
The Sunday night before Christmas, my husband, J.J. and I noticed the tree lot near our apartment had marked all their trees down to $10! Grins stretched across our faces as we made plans to buy one Monday night as soon as J.J. got home from work.
We walked down each row of the tree lot looking for just the right spruce to fit in the corner of our one-bedroom apartment. Feeling sentimental and slightly maternal, I realized that picking our first Christmas tree was going to be almost as difficult as choosing our child’s name.
The sun went down quickly, the tree-lot started to close and the spotlights shut down. There we were, standing in the pitch dark without a tree.
My creative and very patient husband pulled his car into the rows of trees and flashed on his high beams. Suddenly, the bright lights dispelled the darkness and standing in front of me was the most precious tree I’d ever seen. Although it had some droopy branches and a gap on one side, I pointed at it and told J.J., “That’s the one I want!”
Later that night, with my hands wrapped around a cup of hot cocoa, I sat on our couch looking at it. I thought about how sad I felt earlier when the darkness made it impossible to see the trees. Yet, when the beams of light illuminated the lot, my heart filled with hope.
Etched in my mind was a picture I wouldn’t forget, a memory that drew me back to another time marked by darkness – a time when I wasn’t choosing, but needed to be chosen.
Just when it felt like all my dreams had died and my hope was gone, the Light of God’s unfailing love punctured the clouds of darkness and depression surrounding my mind. It happened on another cold winter’s eve in January 1989 while I was sitting in the balcony of a church hoping to hear something that would fill the empty places in my heart. Feeling His Spirit tugging on my heart, whispering words I longed to hear, I sensed God saying, “Renee, you are the one I want.”
He’d been trying to tell me for years, but I had allowed the wounds of my past and the words of others to convince me that no one would ever want me.
At some point, I think most of us have felt like the little Christmas tree and me. Scarred by disappointments, we wonder if anyone would ever choose us. With gaps that make us feel like candidates for rejection, we hope no one will notice our inadequacies. And like the fate of my spruce pine, it seems the only way we’ll get chosen is if all the good ones are picked first.
First Peter 2:9 reminds us that through Christ we are chosen! God sent His Son to light our darkness and fill the gaps in our hearts. Sweet friend, I pray that you will hold onto the truth that God sees you today, and He wants you to hear Him declaring with all His heart, “You are the one I want!”
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Now for Renee’s giveaway. It includes:
Signed copy of her best-selling book A Confident Heart- Living in the Security of God’s Promises – printable
- Bath & Body Works Christmas treat
- Starbucks gift card
To be entered in her giveaway, tell us about your favorite Christmas tree memory. Or, if time is tight, answer this question: Real tree or artificial?
Remember, you have until Sunday night December 16th to comment on all the posts. One grand prize winner will be chosen from among the gals who post on all 12 days! The grand prize is:
A unique advent candle display depicting Bethlehem, Mary and Jesus, with votive holders and candles nestled inside. A $50 retail value. And, along with it, a copy of my new book LET. IT. GO. How to Stop Running the Show & Start Walking in Faith.
I loved my Mom’s flocked trees when we were kids, with the rotating colored light thingy..:)
Well my husband and two sons work in the woods, and we had a lot of snow so I asked them to get me a Christmas tree. Days went by and no tree, so the week before Christmas I was desperate, NO TREE, hahaha so I went out and bought a 4′ artificial tree. They laughed at me, because it was so small, but then I said it was embarrassing because they are in the woods every day, we all got a good laugh out of that one. I still use a real or my artificial tree.
Artificial – due to allergies
Real
Artificial – we have allergies!
Buying the first tree with Todd. I had decided it was too late to buy one but he insisted that we get one (because my artificial tree gotten broken) so we went and got one together ( a huge one) carried it in together and I decorated it. But the time we spent together, turning trees, having dinner before and coffee after was the best part…it was memory making and quality time together.
We have artificial, but I remember laying under my parents real tree, smelling the scent of the tree and watching the lights dance on the ceiling! Very peaceful!
My favorite Christmas tree memory is from the first Christmas that my husband and I were married. We had no extra money. He brought home a live tree that he had cut himself. The thing is…it looked like the Charlie Brown Christmas tree only taller. At first it made me sad to have such a pitiful tree, but in retrospect that tree was very special all decorated with the ornaments I had saved in my hope chest for just that occasion.
When I was a single gal living with a roommate, a friend and I went out and cut down our tree for that year…. we decorated it, and then proceeded to leave it out on our patio until March when we got a “nasty-gram” from our landlord. :)
Real tree! My family enjoys it more, especially the kids. Plus, it smells so good!
REAL tree!
Pre-lit artificial! But a very generous gift from a friend that owns a Christmas shop the first year my husband and I were married! She even included gorgeous ornaments! I have such a beautiful tree, when normally, we wouldn’t be able to afford such extravagance!
Ours is artificial
Artificial!!
i remember as a child the year we had a charlie brown tree- a small 2 ft pine sapling really–but it was a tree in a home filled with love!
We waited until Christmas Eve to get the tree, paid only $5! Brought it home set it up and our dog peed on it. That year we only had a tree up for one day. :)
Many memories of decorating with the children. Two weeks ago my out of state grandsons were here. Ages 8 and 11. They decorated the tree completely by themselves. The looks on their faces as they pulled out ornaments they had not seem before was absolutely precious. This is the most beautiful tree and every ornament is perfectly placed where they put. I am so very blessed.
I think my favorite Christmas tree memory will be this year because I don’t have one up yet. Always have the first week of December but because my Mom has been in the hospital and still not doing any better and my house is being remodeled (a 9 day job is now in it’s 6th week) there is no tree. But I know there will be. I can’t wait to have a tree. I love the tree and all the special ornaments I have collected about Jesus for 43 years now.
Would love a real one – but artifical for now.
Artificial Tree! Although one of these years we may get a real one.
We have a very similar story. It was Christmas Eve on our first Christmas as a married couple, and we had no tree. After the Christmas Eve service at our church. We borrowed a sled, and walked to the convenience store near our house. We brought home the ugliest, yet most beautiful tree we’ve ever had.
a small artificial pre-lit tree topped with a Star of Bethlehem looking light…my sweet husband bought it for us a couple years ago and we put it up together every year since
My favorite Christmas tree memory is a long, funny story but the moral of the story is this “Always remember that Christmas trees look a LOT smaller in the massive ‘christmas tree forest’ than they actually are.”
Definitely real! I love the smell of a fesh tree and remember going to Christmas tree farms every year with my family to choose just the right one. We would come home and have hot cocoa afterward as we put up and decorated the tree.
My favorite Christmas trees memories are wrapped around taking my family out with my Dad to a Christmas tree farm. Out children ran all over looking for the perfect tree, the excitement when they narrowed it down to The tree, cutting it down, cups of hot apple cider while the tree was dealt with and loaded onto the car. Sweet memories!