The last few weeks in our home have been an unveiling of the wear and tear. It seems like every conversation my wife and I have is about a dining room chair that needs replaced or a car with the “check engine” light on. To top it all off, in the last few weeks my daughter practiced her “artwork” on our couch and dining room table with a marker. She also drew on her dad…somehow the only colorful marks that came off were the ones on me.
Don’t you just love how things are constantly wearing out? (Please note the dripping sarcasm.) Tonight while sitting on the ruined couch, I was doing a little furniture shopping online, balking at the prices I was seeing. All of a sudden I heard my little girl crying in her room. It’s funny how when my boys get hurt I seem to bellow things like, “If you’re not bleeding I don’t want to hear about it!” or “Toughen up, you’ll be fine!” yet when my little girl cries, I turn into a 220 pound freight train charging through the house to make sure she is ok. As I looked in the room she looked up and said, “Daddy I got a bump on my head.” As usual, I turned to mush, I tucked her back in her bed and gave her a kiss on her forehead. We ended up talking about Christmas trees, princesses, and her big brothers.
I am amazed at what brings me the most joy can also be what frustrates me the most, like the daughter I adore who also destroys all my stuff. I am also amazed how much time I can spend improving my “way of life,” knowing that everything I buy will eventually decay. The reality is my stuff really hasn’t ever satisfied me. What fills my heart with the most joy are my relationships with loved ones. I guess that’s why when relationships go bad it hurts so much, and when they go right life seems so much better.
There is no doubt we were formed for relationships. One of the greatest passages in the entire Bible is Matthew 1:23, “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel,” which means “God with us.”
Here tucked away in this ancient text we find a gift that gives more than money, power, prestige, or even new furniture ever could, a gift of a relationship. God sent His likeness so that we could know Him. This holiday season remember what matters most … relationships.