There are many different ways to celebrate Christmas. This is merely one of the many.

Christmas is not just about friends, parties, dress-up, big noise, extravagant celebrations, presents, shopping, or feasts; it is also about family, love, and most importantly, Christ, without whom we wouldn’t even have Christmas in the first place.

In this consumerist, materialistic society, who remembers the lonely hearts; those without food, shelter, love, family, friends, and warmth?

Presents, money, friends, parties, grades, positions. They are merely material wants, not spiritual needs. He gives and takes away; I have no right to demand, to hoard, to cling on to, to expect.

I had no right to feel the way I did if I understood the true meaning of Christmas. So, thank you Lord, for my cosy home which shelters me from the ceaseless rain; for my family whose simple love is more than I can ever be grateful for; for a Christmas eve feast painstakingly prepared by Daddy including Turkey with cranberry sauce, vegetable stew, and okonomi-yaki; for log cakes, Old Chang Kee, pancakes, sparking wine, alcohol; for sacrifices, unity, harmony, and peace; for Winnie’s hand-made cards.

Did daddy complain when he had to cook a feast; did mummy complain when she has to work on both Christmas eve and Christmas day? Did Winnie expect reciprocity when she made beautiful cards for all of us?

Amidst my need to busy myself constantly, I guess washing dishes was the only way He could quiet me down and make me reflect and think, to speak to me and give me the understanding I needed.

For now, I’m in harmony with all the things in my life. I accept.

"But as for that in the good soil, these are the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance."--Luke 8:15