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What God Wants to Give Us for Christmas: Eternal Life (Part 2)

Click here to read Part One of “What God Wants to Give Us for Christmas.“ I was so excited this past Christmas about the gift I selected for my husband! It was something he needed, never expected, and actually never considered. His home office chair was made up of bits and pieces from an 8-year-old chair and parts found at a thrift store. It worked and he was excited about his creation. Yet I noticed that as he spent time in the chair, he slowly lowered. The hydraulics no longer worked. And at 6’2”, you need a chair’s hydraulics to work. Otherwise, you look like a giant sitting in a child’s chair—his knees creeping close to his ears. So, his present was […]

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Braving Christmas Alone

By Marlys Johnson Lawry / Faith, Featured

“I’ll wait to open gifts,” I said to myself as large flakes drifted downward. “First, the trail along the river.” Because there’s nothing more magical on Christmas morning than following a river while white, fluffy stuff swirls every which way from the leaden skies. It’s now past noon as I write this. My first Christmas not with family. Five years ago this month, I had head surgery. My husband whisked me away to a nearby mountain resort village for a blissful healing time, even though he was dealing with cancer and the side effects of wretched chemo. We packed food for a simple Christmas dinner, a two-foot tree decked in tiny white lights, and a couple gifts. Seeking the One Who Can

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Mary: A Woman of Honor, Grit, and Grace

By Darlene Brock / Faith, Featured

Honor is the respect, trust, and confidence given to a person, earned by the character exhibited through the life they lived—the outgrowth of living a life of grace. Not easily gained nor easily bestowed. There is one lady that exhibited these qualities in life, one that holds a place of honor in every Christmas Nativity. Sitting calmly aside an infant in a manger placed in a stable filled with animals, I’m not really sure today’s depiction is realistic. If you had birthed a baby in essentially a barn, amidst straw and animals, you probably would not be perfectly coiffed. Joyous but weary, not only from the long trip you made nine months pregnant abreast a donkey, but also suffering through a natural

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mom helping little girl put christmas tree ornaments on their tree

Christmas Tree Ornaments: The Perfect Trip Down Memory Lane

By Brianna Barrett / Life & Culture, Featured

The last few years have felt weird to most of us. The holiday traditions that we once looked forward to have changed—some slightly, some dramatically. Gatherings moved outdoors or stopped altogether. In the chaos and crazy of the holidays, I always find a sense of peace during this time, especially in recent years. I have one family tradition that I just couldn’t stop and I plan to pass down through multiple generations: the collection of meaningful Christmas tree ornaments. Many years ago when I was a teenager, I started collecting ornaments, which was a huge improvement over the shot glass collection I had started. (In my defense, those were inexpensive gift store buys.) These ornaments came from places I had visited, people

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10 Women Share Christmas Memories That Will Warm Your Heart

By The Grit and Grace Team / Life & Culture, Featured

Each Christmas usually arrives with the same lineup of gifts: the big-ticket item you really wanted, some poorly constructed but heartfelt crafts made by your children (macaroni ornaments, anyone?) and the random pairs of socks that someone decided you needed. But occasionally, there’s that one gift you never forget. It might have made you laugh or even cry, but whether you still physically have it or not, it’s never left your mind. Some of Grit and Grace Life’s staff and writers share their favorite Christmas memories and gifts: The Ugly but Heartfelt Gift When I was 18, I had my first “real” boyfriend. I worked at the mall at the time, and I remember he came in to say hi and

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Here’s How to Create Christmas Magic as a Boy Mom

By Kitti Murray / Motherhood, Featured

Several years ago I got this message from Mandy, one of my favorite boy moms: “Am I seriously the only boy mom who has dreams of decorating together at Christmas only to be faced with three boys totally not interested? Just needing some female sympathy.” Well, here’s your sympathy, Mandy. Glad to oblige. It’s hard to sympathize these days, when almost all of my memories of our four-boy-house-Christmas are sweeter than a Leo’s peppermint stick, the kind in the blue tin that my grandmother kept on her coffee table from early November until late January. That’s what the years have done, made me a sentimental amnesiac. But I also feel that lightly singed sensation of having survived something. So I thought it

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