Introduction take two

Okay...I find it so annoying when an author gets you all set up and ready to go in the introduction and than has another forward or prologue or another series of introductory remarks.

So, please accept my apologies on this.

Really...I mean it.

But before I launched head long into what I want to say...
Before I take you on this ride through a few Christmas Carols like looking at Christmas lights...

I want you to pause...ponder what is your favorite Carol?  I even want you to go play your favorite Carol right now.

Really....I mean it.

I will wait.

Did you go play the Carol?

It is okay....I really want you to.

I will wait (after all I published this a few days ago and I am not really here typing anyway!)

Okay...thanks for that.  Because I want you to ask yourself, "Why do you love that Carol?"  Is it the words?  The melody?  Some memory that it awakens when your grandmother would sing that Carol in the kitchen while making cookies?

You see, I needed a second introduction both for space so you could first name your favorite Carol (after all that is what is most important)...and secondly because I want you to get into the groove of listening.  Really listening.  I want us to hear these words....let goosebumps race, run up and down our arms.  I want these words to be breathed into your being.  John 1 says that, "The Word becomes flesh"...that is what I want with these Carols.  Let them get caught up in your DNA so that you are singing them all day.  Let them guide you prayerfully to the manager, the container for God that bursts into a barn (which we will talk about as the most ludicrous moment ever...because it worked and still works).  God entering in not when everything was perfect, but an absolute mess.  God not in a place of power, but poverty.  God not among even good church people like you and me, but among shepherds.  Really?  This kind of truth has be to told with a slant (thanks to Emily Dickenson for that image).  So, this will take time.  To listen.  To listen again.  To listen a third time and prayerfully reflect each day on these carols.

Alright now we can begin.

Really, I mean it.

Grace and peace everyone....