All I Want For Christmas

It is only a cou­ple of more hours until the morn­ing of the twenty-fourth. Christ­mas Eve begins a few more hours after that. I thought this would be a good time to make my Christ­mas wish list. Though I have already received gifts from friends, and I am deeply appre­cia­tive, I have come to real­ize that what I want most for Christ­mas is what no human can give me. More than likely, I am going to have to give some of these gifts to myself. I am a pretty good shop­per, though I am clue­less when it comes to actu­ally shop­ping for oth­ers. Thank heav­ens for cash. Green is not only what peo­ple like to find on their tree, but under it as well. Now back to my list:
First, I want to be able to get back to liv­ing with a sense of pos­i­tive antic­i­pa­tion — like a wise man on a long jour­ney — intrigued by a dis­tant star. I want to be able to drop all that I am and have and go on the soul’s jour­ney in search of immor­tal­ity, and not merely set­tle for rel­a­tive secu­rity and pre­dictable results. I want to be able to read the signs above for God’s actions below.
Sec­ond, I want to be sur­prised by angels bring­ing good news. Usu­ally this comes from read­ing, pon­der­ing, and being open to things oth­ers say. It would be nice this year, if at some point a shin­ing angel crosses my path or con­fronts me about the future. I will set­tle for a flash of insight — with­out com­plaint. Angels do not have to hit me over the head to get my atten­tion. Just one unex­plain­able phe­nom­e­non is all I need to wake me up to life’s mys­ter­ies again.
Third, I want to learn to live at a donkey’s pace, as it saun­ters along with a load of vul­ner­a­ble pos­si­bil­i­ties. For some rea­son, it is the gen­tle walks that I most remem­ber. Maybe that is the pace of God. There seems to be no hurry in the unfold­ing of cre­ation. I don’t want to miss it any­more by rush­ing by it.
None of these things come in pack­ages, and they can­not be pur­chased. They have to be hoped for then real­ized. God’s gifts come in many forms — some­times they are even mate­r­ial. For the most part, they are gifts of the heart. This list is not com­plete. I am like the child that brings a list to Santa — and the list trails many feet behind the tyke. Some­where down the list is: purity of heart, meek­ness, love, joy, peace, patience, kind­ness, etc. My list actu­ally cov­ers a whole book.