If you saw me on the road lately, you saw my parents Christmas tree. The day I got back from vacation my parents asked if I could pick up their tree and dispose of it for them at the dump. Just starting the new job at CF, plus recovering from vacation at the bookstore... time was not readily available... so I picked up the tree early one morning and took it with me on the road.
Two weeks later, and 700+ miles later I threw away the tree.
I've grown close to the tree. Honestly, I've spent more quality time with that dead evergreen than I did my own wife (okay, that's a joke). But I held onto that tree for two weeks for several reasons...
1) nice to have a built-in air freshener for the truck
2) since the tree often blocked the rearview mirror, I had to retrain myself to use the side mirrors...
3) running joke... heard from a lot of people "hey, did you throw the tree away yet?
More than that, though, it was a reminder of Christmas. of holiday. of family. of gifts. of sacrifice. of a baby come to earth to save us.
Modern Christmas is so crazy that it is at times difficult to see the Christ is the chaos, and for two weeks, 700+ miles I had a visual reminder of what that gift was. Pretty sad that I needed a tree to remind me of "the tree"... What's more sad is that I needed my truck bed and left my reminder at the dump Saturday morning at sunrise.
God, thank you for reminders, for Your gift and for Your sacrifice. Thank you for being worthy of our work, our worship, and our praise
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