Christmas Gift
The most exciting moment Christmas morning for children may be when they open their gifts from the Christmas tree. Whenever they open them, they may have a big expectation for what they really want. They wish and expect that there is something they really wanted for their Christmas in the box. When I was a young kid, I really wanted a bicycle, so I eagerly prayed for it. So, whenever I woke up Christmas morning at that time, I looked around my home inside and outside for my new bicycle. But Santa Claus didn’t give me the bicycle until I became middle school age. When I became a middle school student aged boy, I really wanted a video game console for my Christmas gift. So, when I opened my Christmas gift box, I expected it in the box. But something different was in there. My father wanted me to play outside more with my friends at that time. When I became a high school student, I really wanted a personal computer. It was not a necessary item like nowadays, but the need began to spread out from door to door. So, some of my friends already had one and I also expected it for my Christmas gift. But it was so expensive for my father to buy it for me. In each Christmas season, I had some expectations for my gift, but it wasn’t realized, so that I used to be disappointed from the gap between what I expected and what I actually got. You or your sons and daughters maybe also have had very similar experiences in the Christmas season.
Not only in the case of Christmas gifts, but also in our life, we can easily find this gap between what we expect and what really happens. And because of this gap, we are disappointed, we are depressed, and we don’t find any reason why we need to pray. When we believe in God, we always expect something good from God for me, for my family, and for the world, but actually, many things we pray to God for seems not to be responded to in this world. We experience something different from what we really want. How can we approach this problem based on the gap which we frequently experience?
Here, we have to remember that God realizes God’s will, not our expectations. If we fit our expectation to God’s will, if we match our prayer to God’s intention, how wonderful would it be? God will surely answer to that prayers and fill our expectation. I strongly believe that our faith is to give up ours, but to exalt God’s. We have to know what God’s will is and to try to follow it in our faithful journey. Jesus already showed us how to follow God’s will on his cross. This is the reason why the baby Jesus came into the world. Amen.
Pastor Jinha Choi