I love Compassion Canada. Phil and I started sponsoring a little girl from Haiti in 2004 when she was about to turn 6 years old. She is now 13 and is a beautiful young lady. She writes to us about 3 to 4 times a year and we are always excited to read her letters.
We went to a Robin Mark concert last week and he is an advocate for Compassion, and while we were there we decided to take on another child. We were handed a card with a child's info on it and we thought he would be perfect for us. He's a little boy from El Salvador and he will be turning 5 a week before Dawson's 2nd birthday. We thought that having a birthday so close would be cool for Dawson as he grows up.
As missionaries, we don't make a lot of money, but we want to help others as much as we can with our giving. So we see these sponsorships as part of our giving/ tithes to God. Plus, during this time of year, Compassion has a gift guide so you can give a useful gift to a family in a poor area. We loved doing this last year. Instead of Christmas presents to each other, we gave gifts to others who are in need.
I really don't like the whole commercialism side of Christmas, I don't even like the whole "put Christ back in Christmas" because we know that Christmas is not Jesus' birthday and we know that a lot of what we celebrate about Christmas has been added to the stories surrounding his birth (ex: born in a stable, 3 wise men, etc...). I just feel uncomfortable with the whole Christmas thing. So we don't really know what Christmas will look like for us in the future, but I do want it to be a time of giving instead of receiving, a time where our children get to learn about other children who don't have the things that they do, who need their help to live. I don't want Christmas to be a time of selfishness for my children.
We are trying to figure out what we are going to do with Christmas as a family, but we do know that there will not be any Santa (I grew up knowing Santa wasn't real and I am thankful that I didn't have to deal with coming to the realisation that my parents lied to me and all that) and probably no Christmas tree. I haven't researched it much, but I know that there is a passage in Jeremiah 10 that makes me think that the "christmas tree" is not something that began as a Jewish or Christian practice. This is a hard thing to do since I've always loved Christmas and all its traditions, but as I look into the Bible and learn more about the history of Christmas I feel like something needs to change. I don't know... We haven't made concrete decisions about it all yet, we still need to research and pray about it all.
But go check out the Compassion gift guide to help out :) World Vision and Gospel for Asia are doing similar things too.
1 Comments:
My husband and I were discussing the same thing recently. I would be happy with a family meal and no gifts. It seems so fake: it's Christmas, so here's a gift. We all feel pressure to buy each other stuff, even though sometimes we're uninspired. So we end up on the hunt for something - anything! - that the person might like. I hate, hate, hate that! Some friends and I have come to the conclusion that unless we find somehting we absolutely love for each other, there is no pressure to respect the date (Christmas, birthdays, whatever!). We'll just say: 'I haven't found IT yet'! But I find it's not so easy with family. I also love the excitement associated with this day, and all the preparation that goes into it... but it feels like sitting down for a big session of gift exchanges cheapens it so much, even though it's anything but cheap! I also feel like something needs to change, but I don't know what or how, exactly. Keep us posted on your conclusions!
-Monique
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