Merry Christmas

Well, Christmas day is almost here! Josie really has no idea about all of the presents or how we celebrate Christmas day here in America. Thomas asked me if we could wake up in the morning and open gifts, he said,"You know mom, like we did last year." He had no idea that we do that every year, he thought that it was a once in a life time thing. I did explain that we do that every year. Steven, he just loves to group that presents into everyone's pile, we do talk about the fact of why we are really celebrating Christmas. We read the Christmas story about every night or every other night. Steven has been asking a lot of questions about it (ex. tonight he said, how old is Jesus. Or, was Mary and Joseph traveling on this night all of those years ago? Believe me when I say, Steven can ask a lot of questions, but awhile later, I thought he knows that this is true, that it isn't just a story, I know that he knows and I thank God for that b/c so many don't even know about Jesus and His birth).
I think about where I have been this year and how far we have come from last year. Mike was holding Josie and I looked at him and said,"I bet last year at this time you would have never guessed that we would have another child this year." Well, needless to say Mike shook his head that he didn't think that we would. I love those little surprises that God has in store for us. People have asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I said that we are putting a ribbon around Josie and putting her under our tree with a sticker that says To: Mom and Dad and Family.:) We laugh and say we couldn't think of a better gift to get! There is no better gift that we could have gotten this year. We laugh and say that Thomas was our gift last year and Josie is our gift this year. We continue to laugh and wonder what next year will hold. Mike smiles and says, "What happened to getting socks and a tie". For those of you who know Mike, appreciate his sense of humor.
But seriously, after being in Liberia and seeing some of the sights that I seen there, I truly don't want any material gifts this year. I can honestly that I don't want or need a thing for me this year, I have more than I will ever need. When I see things or people on TV and see what they spend, it truly makes me sick when I see what they spend and what people do without in our country and in the other countries around. I think of all of the children and families that could be helped if some of these people could do without the designer purse or the designer carrying bag for their dog, their expensive watches, or their 6 digit cars, or multi-million dollar homes when people are homeless and truly have no hope, when kids have no food or are sick and need $20 treatment for malaria or a $6 malaria net. I am so thankful that my children understand compassion and know that suffering is real and they want to help others. Thomas asked me this week he said, "Mom, could we sell some of our stuff and save our money so that we could adopted more children." I thought to myself, he wants to help others and he knows what it is like to be there and not have a family to call his own or food to eat. Oh, Thomas, how I wish we had enough $ to help them all, or at least more.

What I do wish for is for each of the children at the children's home to have a home, for my sweet Esau and Tracy to have food and good health (which is no guarentee there),education and a mosquito net (which I know that have now:)), for my good friends Robert and Chris and Emmanuel to get an education and be able to spend time with their family. For both of my children's Liberian families to be safe and well. When I think of it, many in Liberia will only get the gift of their own life for Christmas and it is true. Believe me, I heard of one case this week of a boy who had malaria, but there was no way they could take him to the hospital b/c without $ there, a hospital will NOT take you and they don't have to (unlike here where you may not have the best care in the world, but a hospital still has to take you and treat you).
But most importantly for all of them to know that no matter what, God sent His son so that no matter how bad it is, there is hope and that one day we will all be together in Heaven where there will be no suffering.
I am just thankful this year to God for my health, home, and family. I am also thankful that God opened my eyes up to the fact that there is a world out there that needs help, needs God, and He wants to use us to help spread His word and love. But, most of all, I am thankful that so many years ago, God loved me enough to send his son even though He knew what would have to happen eventually, He still sent Him anyway.

Merry Christmas or Merry Christma(as my children say:))(some of you know what I mean:))!