My favorite part of Christmas.

Is still coming to the front of the balcony during Christmas Eve service and watching the flickering candlelight slowly fill the room.

In the past, I've always mourned the un-importance of my single candle flame. I'm just one light in a room full of thousands of lights, how could I possibly be important? I'm just one person in a world with billions of people, how could I ever be significant? Nobody would know if my flame just ceased to exist.

But today as I knelt there at the edge of the balcony, holding my single candle flame, I realized how beautiful it is that I am part of this world, and how precious my one life is.

I may be one single light, but that light is precious. Today I realized that who I am doesn't have to be someone who's wildly unique, original, decisive, and sure. I don't have to spend all my effort trying to make myself -- or even discover myself -- into someone who's "unique" or "set apart."

I am a part of this world. I am one light in a sea of little lights, and it's okay.

A lot of my Christian upbringing has included a large dose of the "you are unique and special" message. And while I don't deny that, I think it has a tendency to make us (or at least me) feel as if I must be better and more special than everyone else in the world.

But -- and I'm going to link you up to this post again because that's how good it is --

There is power in being common.

"If I am...a wise person-- I will seek to understand the things that all men share inside of themselves, instead of the things that set them apart from each other. Why was my self-value wrapped up in the ways that I perceive myself differing from other men?" (Gray)

This little light of mine is wild and precious. It can start fires. It's just the same as everyone else's -- but it's mine. It was lit by my Creator. And I'm going to live it, love it, and let it shine.

Christmas is finally here.

Despite the fact that I'm one of those Christmas-begins-the-second-thanksgiving-is-over-or-sometimes-earlier kind of person, I persuaded my brother to try an experiment with me this year.

Objective: See how long we can go without putting up the Christmas tree.

Our theory? Parents only do this for their kids. Once we're old enough to reach the top of the thing, if the kids don't take initiative, it won't happen.

Our prediction: We'd make it to Christmas eve before they noticed the tree wasn't up.

However, this process nearly killed us, and we finally just went up to the attic, drug the tree down, and put it up.

And now, it can really be Christmas.

Oh yes.

CHRISTMAS BREAK IS HERE!!

That's right, I just finished my LAST FINAL of my first quarter at real school.

Happiness does not even describe. I also had a peppermint mocha to celebrate.

SAT studying, piano practicing, California debaters, speeches, actually blogging, awana quizzing, SLEEPING, Christmas shopping, hanging with my friends....BRING IT ON!

I feel like I can breathe now. I have time to read books. I can guiltlessly spend hours on the phone or run out with my friends. I don't have to worry about wasting time. I can spend an hour on debate without worrying about a single English paper that I should be doing. I can just chill with my little brother. Also, have I mentioned that my sister is coming home for Christmas??

I'M SO HAPPY RIGHT NOW!!!!!!

Early's on time.

My favorite part of halloween is when the local Christian radio station plays Christmas music all day. I used to be a Christmas-music-is-only-for-December purist, but I have since changed from my old ways and now listen to it in November.

And just today, my favorite band (tenth avenue north, of course) released A NEW CHRISTMAS SONG! (que massive excitement)

Yes, it's dumb, it's not the best Christmas song ever, but it's tenth avenue north, and it's Christmas.





Even though I'm really excited for Christmas, I am absolutely loving the fall weather - no rain, crisp, cold mornings, fog, hot tea, and crunchy leaves.

:)

Merry Christmas, world. (:

I think my favorite part about Christmas is definitely Christmas Eve service: and I've especially enjoyed it at my church the past two years.

I love to sit in the balcony - where we always do - and look over the edge to see the a thousand tiny lights filling the whole room with a beautiful glow.

I love watching as the choir members come down, and light their candle from the advent candles. And for awhile it's just 3 or 4 little lights making their way down the aisle. But slowly, the light starts to spread. And as we swing into another verse of The First Noel, it spreads more. Until, by the time we have begun Silent Night, the whole room glows.

And you think.

One light. That's all I am. Not enough to pierce the darkness myself. But when we join together with thousands of other lights and hold them up high: look at the difference it makes.

One of my friends posted recently about Christmas - and how it doesn't feel quite so Christmassy this year.

The past couple years have been especially so for me. It might be for lack of church family, the fizzling out of traditions, or the fact that presents aren't quite so exciting as they used to be.

I think it's the lack of anticipation.

Christmas is all about anticipation. The preparation, the planning. Shopping, wrapping, finding something just right for someone and keeping it a secret for the whole month.

My friend and I like to get each other presents for our birthdays and Christmas. But half the fun of the presents is the fact that we taunt each other to no end about what it is. We drop each other casual hints, random hints, irrelevant hints, and send each other intentionally blurry pictures of it. They aren't generally very big presents, but we always find ourselves in delightful anticipation of whatever it is that is to come.

The birth of the Messiah was an anticipated event for years and years. Prophets wrote about it and scholars studied it. The Israelites waited and waited for the promised Messiah to come and save them from those who oppressed them.

Last year, my family started celebrating advent - something we'd never done at our old church. But our new church did, so we tried it out. I always thought advent was just counting down till Christmas - but it's so much more than that.

Every night, we read a section from our storybook: a historical fiction about a young boy and his adventures as he learns about the coming Messiah and eventually gets to meet the child who will be His Savior.

The amazing thing that I loved about this was the anticipation. The focus wasn't on the presents, Christmas day, or whatever it was we were getting. The focus was on the coming Messiah. That a Savior would soon be born during their lifetimes.

And it brought into a different light the anticipation of Jesus' birth and the beauty of it. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be there, in the stable, when Jesus was born? To read the Torah and to wonder when this Messiah would come?

The days until Christmas are filled with the waiting and anticipation of discovering the contents of the packages under the tree. But Advent is about the anticipation of Christ's birth.

Which....is what I love about Christmas.

Christmas vs. Me

I've done a lot of thinking about Christmas. I love it. I'm the type who listens to it in October and begins planning quite early. Snow, trees, food...I love it all.

But lately I've been sort of scrooge-ish...and for a number of reasons. (all while still listening to Christmas music, posting about Christmas, and running around in the snow...)

-Jesus wasn't actually born on Christmas. The whole "Jesus is the reason for the season" is rather stupid and quite honestly not true. Christmas began as a pagan holiday and still is.
-"Giving is better than getting" is overrated. People say it to mask their mad desire for gifts. They don't mean it and they don't believe it.
-Christmas is so very over-commercialized. All holidays are, come to think of it, but Christmas especially. I take traditions and holidays rather seriously, because I believe they are important. But one of my greatest pet peeves when it comes to holidays are consumer products that are cheap, fake, poorly made, short-lived, and overly marketed. It downplays the importance of it. It lessens the effort you put into it. It makes it easy, cheap, and heartless.

Love is giving - love is selfless. It's not giving if you didn't give it out of love. It's not giving if you didn't put some part of yourself into it.

On the other side, why do I love Christmas?

-I love traditions. Something that is repeated only on certain occasions tells me it has meaning. Something that is specially set aside and "sacred", if you will.
-I love the seasonal change. Snow, cold, trees, red and green. I love cozy, warm things, decorations...
-Memories...family...friends...time spent together. My primary love language is quality time...which is probably why I hate cheap consumer products. There's not a single ounce of someone's genuine time put into that.
-I like the focus on Christ. Even if He wasn't born on Christmas: it's a different perspective. It's an idea centered around Christ and the celebration of something great. It's a break from normal life to elevate Christ even more.

So what do I think? I hate commercialism, I love Christmas. Giving is a great idea, but so many people do it in a heartless way just to please "Christians" and to mask their greedy hearts.

I hate the typical "so this Christmas, think about...[insert meaningful and unreachable ideal here]" blah blah blah. How many people actually are impacted by the typical "Jesus is the reason so giving is better than getting" speech?

Why do I celebrate Christmas?

Is it because everyone else does it?
Because I genuinely love the celebration?
Because I actually want to celebrate the incarnation of Jesus?

Quite honestly, I'm not sure why I celebrate Christmas. There are obviously legitimate reasons for celebrating it or for not celebrating it.

But. I do know this - that no matter what the holiday, time, or occasion, that Christ should be our focus. Christmas is a time when we can look at the awesome beauty of the fact that the God of the universe became next to nothing in order to save those who had turned their backs against Him. Not that we can't look at this any other time - but I guess that's what celebrations are for, right? Remembrance? To elevate something you prize as important?

So, during this Christmas season, during this celebration and remembrance - I want every move I make to be one that is elevating what I truly hold as the most important - that is, Christ. Not necessarily the giving, not necessarily the family, the traditions, the putting-others-first: because those are things that should flow out of my life as a result of my love for Christ: when Christ is put first.

Finally!

There's such a disparaging lack of decent Christmas blog backgrounds out there - actually, there's a terrible lack of decent ANYtime blog backgrounds out there...most of which I blame my friend Inders for making me such a web-design perfectionist.

I also had to go back to the normal template [::sob::] because I couldn't find any to fit the spiffy new one. So everything's a little more squished up again. [::wheeze::]

Of course, it is rather late to be finally changing my blog up, but ah, well. Life is far too busy.

Today in church, they had all their train sets up and so so so much WONDERFUL FOOD. I loooove the Sunday before Christmas! It's such fun to see all the trains and there were SO MANY this year! And I didn't have my camera. [boooo.]

The sermon was really good too - it was about focusing not on the "how" of our problems: as in, how to fix them, what to do to make things better, but rather the "who": the one who holds all in the palm of His hand. He talked a lot about how when we give Christ our brokenness, pain, and death: He exchanges it with joy, renewal, and life.

In other news, MY BIG SISTER IS COMING HOME FOR CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!! (whom I haven't seen in a year!!!) sad;fkharieudsj I'm so excited. (:

::sigh::

Well. That was a random update.

Keep seeing Dawn Treader!
(oho, you thought you could get out of hearing about that movie for at least one blog post, eh? sorry. =P )

Love, Hannah

Aslan's Meditations: Room for the King

I wrote the devotional for this week on Aslan's Country - enjoy! (: The actual post is here.

All three times that I’ve seen Dawn Treader so far, there is one line that particularly stuck out to me – not in an odd, awkward way – but that it was done very, very well, and it got me thinking.

When they are being taken captive by the slave traders on Narrowhaven, two men have Caspian’s hands behind his back, and he desperately yells to them:

“Listen, you insolent fool! I – am – your – KING!”

But they paid no heed: instead they bound him and locked him in a dungeon.

The slave traders didn’t know Caspian was their king. They didn’t know that he had come to set things right on their island and to bring peace. They didn’t know he was the one they should be following.

As the Christmas season approaches, it got me thinking – that’s what the Romans did to Jesus when He was born. Obviously He couldn’t cry out Himself, but the skies shook with the glory and celebration of the birth of our King and Savior.

“And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:
“ Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” (Luke 2:13-14)

It says ‘Look, world – a KING has been born. Your King, your Savior, the Messiah’

But as Christ grew and taught, that’s also what the scribes, Pharisees, priests, and mobs did to Him. Scorned Him, beat Him, refused to believe.

How obvious would it have been to the slave traders if they had taken a second look at Caspian? They might find a signet ring, Peter’s sword – maybe treasure, wealth, and fame. They could look at the way he dressed, talked, acted, and carried himself. All these things that would show them in a heartbeat that Caspian was, indeed, a great king.

It doesn’t take more than this second look to see this about Christ. Had the Romans really sought to find out just who this Man was – they might have found something completely different than the mobs and crowds seemed to cry.

Would the slave traders have seen Caspian differently if they were torn, broken, and living in poverty? The people of Narrowhaven did. In the battle on Narrowhaven, there are a few shots of the people – and you see in their eyes a kind of wide and awestruck wonder and excitement. I can just imagine them thinking “who are these people who have come to save us? And why?”

It is for those who humble themselves to look at who Christ really is that He saves.

Jesus says in Luke 5:32 - I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.

So often, we treat God as though He’s just there to help us when we’re in trouble. Just there to be a powerful, magical force who cleans up after us and takes away our pain. Our culture has grown up with the idea that God is a being who needs our worship. Who needs our praise.

What a lie.

God doesn’t need us at all. We, like the people of Narrowhaven, are broken, tormented, and living in the poverty of the choices we have made and the sin that surrounds us.

Yet God wants to have a relationship with us.

Have you ever stopped to meditate on the beauty of that?

Because God is not just a being out there who comes when we need Him, fixes things up, and then leaves so we can revel in the glory of our own accomplishments. He’s not just a god who needs our worship to make Him happy – or a force that must be pleased with certain rituals in order to keep Him quiet and out of the way. He’s not a vending machine who gives us what we wants if we put the right amount in and push the right buttons.

In fact, He’s anything but that.

He is – GOD.

He is not only the one who comforts us in our pain, works out our problems, and requires our worship. He is so much more than that.

He is our Creator, Master, Father, Savior, King, and everything we ever needed. He is so much greater, bigger, and mightier than anything we could imagine. He is glorious beyond comprehension.

Psalm 19:1-3

The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
² Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.
³ There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.

Psalm 144:3

³ LORD, what is man, that You take knowledge of him?
Or the son of man, that You are mindful of him?

This God, this Lord, this Creator of all and majestic and high beyond all others – this is the One who humbled Himself to obedience – to the point of death as a human. (Phil. 2:5-8)

I can imagine Jesus thinking…or maybe even wanting to yell out to the world: “I AM YOUR CREATOR! YOUR SUSTAINER! THE ONE WHO DIED FOR YOU!”

Not only did Bethlehem have no room for their King when He was born, but the world didn’t either.

Like the slave traders though, the Romans disregarded whatever evidence there may have been for Kingship and beat, tortured, mocked, and killed Jesus – the very man who had come to save them.

And what about our world today?

Especially during the hubbub of the Christmas season – it’s so easy to forget about Christ – who He really is and what that means to us.

Christmas may not have been when Christ was really born – but how often do we get caught up even in the idea of “giving” or “helping” others – and lose sight of the real reason we live and breathe and do anything?

1 Corinthians 10:31 says therefore whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Every breath I take, every move I make, should not only recognize Christ as my King and Savior, but proclaim it to anyone I encounter.

Puddleglum, in The Silver Chair, he emphatically states

"I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia."

Do we live as though we have Christ in our lives, that we acknowledge Him as King? Or do we trample Him, lock Him up under the excuse of “business”, “work”, “holidays”, “this is important”, or whatever other ideas we come up with?

When we hear Christ say “I – am – your – KING!” what does that mean to us? Do we respond by continuing about our normal lives as if Christ was never a part? Or does it move us to worship and bow before Him because He IS our King?

1 Timothy 1:17 - Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

Images from AslansCountry facebook page and google images.

Christmas is over...

And a New Year has begun! But seeing as winter is still here, I've found a nice, cozy wintry background that's not entirely Christmas. (:

Sorry about the little posting-spree lately...once school starts I won't have much time to post quite so much. :P

Here's a quote I read this morning that I really like.

Personality is the unique, limitless part of our life that makes us distinct from everyone else. It is too vast for us even to comprehend. An island in the sea may be just the top of a large mountain, and our personality is like that island. We don't know the great depths of our being, therefore we cannot measure ourselves. We start out thinking we can, but soon realize that there is really only one Being who fully understands us, and that is our Creator. ~Oswald Chambers

Christmas things...

One of my favorite things about Christmas is church. I especially am beginning to love advent - the candle lighting, stories, and all. Our family has been reading "Jotham's Journey", which is an advent story, and I LOVE it. It's so well written and sometimes we purposely skip a day so we can read two the next day because we can't stand the cliffhangers! =P

Last week we sang "Zither Carol" at church. I LOVE this song. I think the congregation really enjoyed it too.

This week our handbell choir played background music. I absolutely LOVE handbell choir. It's so much fun!!

I love this picture. These are the biggest bells, which Raymond and Jared got to play. The smallest ones are about half the size of your hand. [whereas these are about what, twice the size of your head?? =P]

Our little flute trio! I absolutely love our flute group. It makes me happy. =)

Katy and I just learned 4-in-hand about 2 weeks ago. 4-in-hand is where you have two bells in each hand [as opposed to one] and it's really tricky at first, but once you get the hang of it, you feel reeeally smart. :P We had a lot of fun playing and learning together as you can probably see....

Geneva Hall was decorated beautifully - all the trains everywhere and trees and decorations. I loved it.
The train tree

For at least this year, my favorite part about Christmas is definitely church. All the special music, decorations, candles, advent...I love it. =)

Titles are for those with creative minds...

Today has been a long day. And it's not half over. And the rest of the week is going to be long.

I spent this morning playing flute for a Hanukkah party with the Union Gospel Mission. I think I played for a total of 1.5 hours...which is a long time just to be playing background music...in dress shoes and with no food. But I loved it, and the seniors did too. I really love to play my music for people like that...because they love it, and I love to bless others in that way.

One of the seniors is friends with my sister [who's coming home TOMORROW!!] and she was talking to her on the phone during the event - and came up and held the phone up so that she could hear me playing. It was quite funny. (My sister usually plays for this event but wasn't home in time this year)

Tomorrow....is going to be a really long day. And I'm exhausted already. So please pray that everything will go smoothly and I'll have lots of energy. =) I will have lots of pictures and will tell you all about it afterwards!

Love, Hannah

I'm bored. And *slightly* hyper.

So! I'm going to make a random post. Because I'm bored and feeling random. And childish and immature. And I will probably look back at this post and be all like, "wow, was I dumb", because I'm not really thinking properly about how my sentences are worded....[see? that didn't even sound right..]

Heeheehee...oh, the joys of being random and hyper. But, there is some cause for my joys, as you shall soon see in the sentences that follow....[boy that sounded lame...]

1) My big sister is coming home for Christmas! In 8 days!! And just in case you're thinking "what in the world?? Hannah doesn't have a big sister", it's true, I do. But she adopted me, and we're not biological sisters. But we're sisters. =)

2)We started a flute group at church. I'm loving it. Immensely. I haven't played with a group of people just for fun in a long time and it felt really good. Plus I got to sing for the first time with the choir, and that was loads of fun.

3) Christmas time is always happy....

4) Did I mention my big sister is coming home for Christmas?

5) It's sunny out. I'm quite happy. And as cold as it is, I really like it. And I think so long as it stays sunny, I shall be positive about the lack of snow. However, if it decides to rain and stay this cold, I might have reason to complain. But So Far, it's sunny, so I'm happy.

6) I had hot chocolate this morning. and it was warm. Oh, and there was a gigantic vanilla bean marshmallow that I had with it. It was lovely.

7) I forgot to tell you that my sister is coming home for Christmas! =P

Love,
Hannah

PS if you're wondering why this post is tagged "purpleness" it's because I really wanted to use the tag, and because this post is random, I saw it a useful place to use it. :P

PPS please tell me if I made a really embarrassing typo and didn't notice it. [I tend to not notice things when I'm hyper] And please comment, because I love comments. =P

Little Joys in life...

...are causes of much happiness. :) [did that make sense...?]

Yesterday, I had half a donut in piano class....didn't think it'd do that much, [just a half, right??] but I was insanely hyper...then I discovered that my favorite movie company of all time, Sherwood Pictures, is making another movie!!! ::squeal::

View the "trailer" here =D ::dances::

THEN, today is Halloween. We don't celebrate halloween, but Spirit 105.3, the local Christian radio station, is playing Christmas music all day for their "halloween costume" which is just...way cool. I think Matthew rubbed all this Christmas excitement off on me, because now I'm psyched about Christmas...and it's only October!!!!

You can listen to the amazing Christmas music here =D

And...ooh, did I mention I had a brownie last night? Wait, maybe it was 2....And I'm just all around happy right now, which is odd...and weird...but, it's a nice feeling. and I love Christmas. I'm thinking about changing my blog background for Christmas early. =P

Plus I've been having the most amazing time with some of the most amazing people getting ready for the recital mentioned in the post before.