Lesson Two from the Wise Men: Look for the Good

“…the star appeared again, the same star they had seen in the eastern skies. It led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: They were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time! They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcame, they kneeled and worshipped him.”

A few years ago I was in a queue at The Warehouse and I could see a little boy sitting with a security guard. My first thought was, “Oh that poor boy. I wonder if he is lost”. The woman behind me was with her children and she also noticed the little boy. She pointed him out to her children and said, “Look at that boy kids. He must have stolen something. Make sure you don’t end up like him.”

Some people naturally see the world differently.

This incident reminded me of one of the movies I grew up with; the old Disney movie with Haley Mills called Pollyanna. Pollyanna is a young girl who is always trying to find things to be glad about, even in the worst situations. Her family were very poor missionaries and her father wrote a letter to people who support them asking for a doll for Pollyanna, but there was a mix-up and instead of getting a doll they got crutches. So her father invents the Glad Game. They had to come up with a reason to be glad to have the crutches. The only reason they came up with was that even though they had them, they were glad that none of them needed to use them. Pollyanna is the ultimate optimist. (She would have been straight down to the stable to see the new King.)

One of my favourite quotes is from this movie. It is engraved on Pollyanna’s necklace and says:

"When you look for the bad in mankind expecting to find it, you surely will."

This always comes to mind when I know I might need to deal with someone who annoys me, or who I struggle to get on with – I remind myself to stop focusing on the bad, but to look for the good and I will find it! Even on days when I’m exhausted, the house is a mess, the kids are crazy and I have a hundred things to do; I have to remind myself to look for the good in my life, stop focussing on the bad – because there is a lot of good, it is just hidden under all the toys and washing. But it is so easy to look for and then find the bad; in people, in life, and if you wanted to – even in God.

For me, Christmas is the time of year to really be thankful, but to be truly thankful you need to look for things to be thankful for.

I live in South Auckland – a place where it can be very easy to find the bad. The media has no problem doing that. But something happened to me a few years ago to remind me that there is a great heart in this place. I was heavily pregnant with baby number four and I was making my way from the supermarket with hands full of grocery bags.  While waiting at the pedestrian crossing, a man in a very flash car just drove on by – he did not see that I was waiting there. Suddenly a woman who was not crossing but just walking past at the time, who looked like a typical South Auckland tough chick yelled at him - You f**kin’ d*ck! I looked at her and she raised her chin at me as if to say – That was on your behalf – and I just thought, Wow that was so sweet!

Sometimes good does not look like what you think it should, but when you see it, it is important to acknowledge it and be thankful for it.

I often wonder what the Wise Men were expecting when they followed that star. It would have been so easy, and really understandable, for them to only see the bad and feel disappointed when they reached their destination. To see that stable, the poor family sheltered inside, that vulnerable baby. But they were far from disappointed. ‘They could not contain themselves’ and they bowed down in worship.

 

They went looking for the good. They found a poor baby in a stable, but saw a King.

I am thankful for these to lessons from the Wise Men; to get excited and to look for the good.

So in closing I want to challenge you to really embrace this Christmas and the spirit of the season. Instead of acting cool and like Christmas is for the kids and you’re just looking forward to the break that goes with Christmas – maybe set your sights a little higher.

Get rid of cynicism and get excited instead! Embrace your cheesy, hand-holding, American Christmas movie, Touched by an Angel-side, and have some high expectations of what God could do as this year comes to a close and a new year begins.

 Be like the Wise Men – don’t worry about looking like a fool.

Take a risk, have a little faith – and let yourself be taken on a journey.
Look for the good because you never know what could be in store, so why not expect something great.

Have a very Merry Christmas everyone.

 

Lesson One from the Wise Men: Have Faith and Get Excited

“…the star appeared again, the same star they had seen in the eastern skies. It led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: They were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time! They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcame, they kneeled and worshipped him.”

 I am not massive on gift-giving myself, but Christmas and gift giving is massive for my family.  Gift giving is one of my dad's main love languages and we got a lot of love at Christmas. My siblings and I were very spoilt. We had to write a list every year - at the end of November dad would start pestering us for our lists. He would actually get angry if we were late in giving him our lists. When I moved out of home one of my best friends moved in to my room and he even asked her to write a list!

He was really precise about it as well - making sure we all had the same number of gifts, even the same number of big gifts and small gifts. And we got big gifts too! Dressing tables, bikes, one year we looked out the window and Santa had left us a massive trampoline. This is something that has continued with my kids – it is handy because we don’t get them much knowing that my parents will spoil them rotten just like they spoilt us.

When I was about 10 my parents had the wall separating the dining room and the living room removed to make it one big space. This meant that when I was little, on Christmas morning, the rule in my family was we weren't allowed to go into the lounge until everyone was up, dressed and had breakfast. We weren't even allowed to open the door to the lounge to sneak a peek at what Santa had left us and if we did we were in trouble. You imagine being 5 years old and knowing that Santa has just left a pile of presents on the other side of the door and you can’t even look at them – it was a mixture of joy and torture – and it was so fun!

I wish I could feel like that more often. I am not satisfied with saying that I am grown up now - so I will never feel that way again, because there have been times as an adult when I have felt that way. Leading up to my wedding for example, coming back home from the UK, having my babies -I had that same Christmas morning feeling of excitement and anticipation for all of these events in my life.

This is what draws me to the Wise Men in the Christmas story.

Herod heard that the Wise Men were in town looking for the new-born King of the Jews. So he gathers a group of priests and religious scholars to ask them where the king will be born. The scene in my mind is of a frightened, paranoid Herod telling this group of scholars about the foreigners in town looking for a new king. Feeling more of an allegiance to Herod than to God at this point, they tell him where the king will be born.

And then they do nothing.

 

They do not quickly pack their bags to join the Wise Men on the journey. There is no excitement, no nervous anticipation that this might just be the one they have been waiting for. When I read this I get the impression that their response is kind of, “yeah right, we’ll see”.

 

This is in stark contrast to the Wise Men. They see the star. They leave their homes, their comfort zone. They go on a journey to find a King and even when they find that king in a humble stable, the Bible says that ‘They could hardly contain themselves’ and they kneel to worship him.

‘They could hardly contain themselves.’ That is how I felt on Christmas morning as a child, and I wish I could feel that way more often now.

 Obviously we cannot feel that way all the time. It would be weird to have a sense of expectation and anticipation throughout the year. But what are we missing out on when we do not feel that way at all, or act on that feeling?

I am always trying to avoid disappointment. If you are familiar with my blogs already, then you will know that my husband and I even created a word for it – Grinching, which basically means to manage your expectations in order to avoid disappointment.

Even though my husband and I created this term there are times when grinching is not good. Where instead of protecting ourselves from disappointment and being cynical it is better to step out of our comfort zones, like the Wise Men, and have more of an expectation that something great is about to happen.

This can be applied to so many areas of life. For example, when someone you know is really trying to change their lives for the better, or trying to loose weight, or break a bad habit. It can even be appiled to faith.

I do not always act like one of the Wise Men when it comes to faith.  I am sometimes more like one of the religious scholars. I know a lot about God. I went to Bible College after all! But I do not always live out, or get remotely excited about what I know. It is safer to just wait and see what happens.

The trouble with faith is that it makes a fool out of you. It is cooler to be cynical.

I love a good dose of cynicism. It is the reason I love British comedy. There is less cheese and it has a cutting edge to it. It is even easy to be cynical at Christmas. When you are cynical and you have no expectations and you don’t take risks - you don’t get made a fool of and you are not disappointed. Hope and faith, and anticipation can make you appear very foolish. Cynicism may be cool, but it is not always fun, and you do not grow.

 The Wise Men went looking for a king and found a baby in a stable.  But they did not feel foolish. ‘They could not contain themselves.’ By all accounts, this was the greatest day of their lives.

This is the first lesson that the Wise Men taught me; to get excited about the things that are worth getting excited about.  Because ultimately I am on a journey and I trust that, like the Wise Men, there is something wonderful waiting for me at the end.

To Home, With Love...

How do you thank someone who has taken you from crayons to perfume?

It isn’t easy but I’ll try.

 

When Lulu sang these words in To Sir With Love it was a dedication to the teacher who had guided her into adulthood. I would like to make a similar dedication – to a house. This week I say goodbye to the house that I grew up in. It has been a part of my life for all of my 32 years. 

 

Leading up to this week I had thought that the only thing I would be upset about is leaving my cat, Bobby, who is buried in the backyard. But something has changed this week and I have been shedding tears and losing sleep like a crazy person. Over a house! Over some land, wood, tiles, carpet, electrics and plumbing. It seems so ridiculous to me. So I have been questioning why this is affecting me so much. At first I wondered if it was because I am grieving the loss of my childhood. But I don’t think so because I have four kids, so I am reliving my childhood everyday – and it is even better the second time around!

 

Losing my family home feels like losing a family member. This house has aged with me, it has been damaged by me, and yet it has still been good to me by keeping me warm and sheltered.

 

I am losing the biggest comfort blanket I've ever had – and it has been with me for as long as I can remember.

 

When I lived in the UK and dreamed of coming home, I didn’t dream of just anywhere in New Zealand – I dreamed of that house, those rooms, that driveway.

 

I know that this is self-indulgent, but when I started writing this blog, it was so I could get all my thoughts and feelings out of me in a creative way. And at the moment I am over-flowing with the need to say goodbye and thank you to an old family friend.

 

Every inch of that house has a memory attached to it - a lot of them terrible, but many more are truly great. I want to take some time to give just a small glimpse into some of those memories. I would hope that anyone could relate to them. My home and my family is not more special or different than any other. So hopefully my self-indulgence will have moments of familiarity to you, Maybe it will even help you appreciate the comfort blankets that you have, while you still have them. 

 

My parents room

• Sneaking into bed with mum and dad
• Pretending that the bed was a boat and we took turns being sharks

 The bathroom

• Sharing so many baths with my sisters and brother
• Fainting when I had the flu (the only time in my life I have done so) and hitting my head on the bath

 The toilet

• For some reason I was the one brave enough to be on plumbing duty. Fun times in a family of six.

 The second bedroom

• Having a secret hiding place in the closet with my cousin, where she told me some things about Santa that frankly, I am still in denial about.
• Singing to the mirror using my brush as a microphone. (Anything from the Footloose soundtrack. Let's hear it for the boy! )

 The third bedroom

• Lying in bed and twisting the curtains, then letting them go and watching them spin.
• Trying to stay awake in bed till dad got home, so he could give me a hug, spin me around the room and say goodnight.
• Playing murder in the dark, charades, and building a fort!
• Throwing my sister's stereo across the room and smashing it against the wall. (Don't make a tween angry).

The ‘fourth bedroom’

• Originally a hall way, then a play room, then the smallest bedroom ever! (My bedroom for my teen years)
• Having no wall paper, so the walls got covered in messages from friends and family
• Waking up early to do the paper run
• Banging on the wall because the TV was too loud!
• Having my boyfriend (now husband) come to my window to say goodnight.
• The twin's nursery when we came back from the UK

The kitchen

• Mum's cooking! Chop suey, sweet and sour pork, pineapple cake...mmmmmmmm
• Failing at cooking rice because I didn't add water, and at cooking mashed potatoes because I didn't boil them. (I was not a clever child).

The conservatory

• Originally a balcony, it was used as a dance floor when first built.
• So many great parties!
• VHS, DVDs, spare bed, cane furniture - no room for parties anymore.
• So loud when it rained.

 The driveway

• Distributing the Auckland Star to the delivery boys and girls
• Washing the car, birthday parties, lolly scrambles, squirt with a hose on hot days
• Peeing on the doorstep after school because no one was home and I couldn't hold it. (TMI?)

 The front yard

• Handstands
• 'Salt, pepper or mustard'
• Gardening very early on a Saturday morning

 The back yard

• Kids pool, going down to the creek, lying out in the sun or the shade
• Trampoline - which was stolen after about a decade without us noticing for who knows how long (Hey, did you get rid of the tramp? No it's still there. No it's not. Who steals a tramp?)

 The lounge and dining room

• Where so much life happened - every topic has been discussed and every emotion has been experienced around that table.
• Finding out that we had lost grandpa, nana...friends, family...
• Awkward and awful family meetings
• Christmas! (Trying to take a peek into the lounge to see the presents when there was a wall separating the dining room - but not being allowed till we had eaten breakfast.)
• Creating dances and putting on shows for family (If only it had stayed in the family).
• Aunties and cousins laughing hysterically at the WWF
• So much laughter!
• So many games!
• Rugby World Cup 2011! (And every major, and even not-so-major, sporting event before then)
• My twin girls taking their first steps - hilarious!

 

The memories are not restricted to the house. That street was so great to grow up in. Perfect for riding your bike. My cousin and I had our own 'Bicycle Olympics' going at one point. (Yes - we were that cool). There is the park down the road, the bus stop where I would catch the bus to school, even the dairy where the owners still recognise me when I walk in.

 

It will be so hard to say goodbye, but I have not really lived in that house since I was 19, so I know that I carry it all with me. It reminds me to treasure the memories I am making with my own little family.

 

When my husband and I bought our first home it was only a five minute walk away from my parents. We our now in our second home, and my parents are moving a five minute walk away from us. Their new house is beautiful and I can see great times ahead for all of us.

But first, I have to say goodbye to my home.

 

Goodbye Heathberry Close. You were a wonderful home. Thank you for being so good to us. Sorry if we ever took you for granted. You will always be a blessing. I'll miss you. Love Gwen xo