Thankful Thursday: Free Will

My pur­pose in writ­ing is sim­ply this: that you who believe in God’s Son will know beyond the shadow of a doubt that you have eter­nal life, the real­ity and not the illu­sion. And how bold and free we then become in his pres­ence, freely ask­ing accord­ing to his will, sure that he’s lis­ten­ing. And if we’re con­fi­dent that he’s lis­ten­ing, we know that what we’ve asked for is as good as ours.

1 John 5:13 (The Message)

The Divine Cre­ator made us with an impor­tant attribute: Free will.

A few days ago, I was in a local office sup­ply store. In my search for the items I needed, I rounded a cor­ner and was con­fronted with a large dis­play of 2008 cal­en­dars and plan­ners. I did a double-take before remind­ing myself that it is already Octo­ber. Why is it that every year seems to go faster than the one before it?

So as I decided to pick out a plan­ner for next year, my eye wan­dered to the dis­play next to the cal­en­dars: Christ­mas cards!

“No,” I mut­tered to myself, “I can­not deal with those yet.” Main­tain­ing my resolve, I com­pleted my pur­chases and did not even look at the brightly col­ored greet­ing cards.

But I’ve been think­ing about the upcom­ing hol­i­days in the days since. I had an epiphany: I real­ized that, for the first time in my life, I can choose to spend the hol­i­day sea­son in any way I please! I am no longer con­strained by my oblig­a­tions to the insti­tu­tional church which always kicked into high gear imme­di­ately fol­low­ing Thanks­giv­ing and con­tin­ued through the New Year.

For the first time in my life, I can exer­cise my free will to devise a unique, mean­ing­ful way to cel­e­brate the birth of the Sav­ior — and maybe even start a new tradition.

Grow­ing up, of course, I spent the hol­i­days in the man­ner my fam­ily dic­tated and, as a col­lege stu­dent and young, inde­pen­dent adult, also returned to my fam­ily home and tra­di­tions which always included par­tic­i­pa­tion in church activ­i­ties. After estab­lish­ing my own home and fam­ily, that tra­di­tion con­tin­ued, espe­cially as my par­ents aged, became grand­par­ents, and longed to carry on the estab­lished rou­tines sur­round­ing hol­i­days and milestones.

But now that I have eschewed asso­ci­a­tion with the insti­tu­tional church, a wide vari­ety of options present them­selves. For instance, I have always wanted to spend Christ­mas safely tucked into a cabin on a snow-covered hill­side. I have always thought it would be lovely to spend Christ­mas Eve lis­ten­ing to car­ols and dec­o­rat­ing a large pine tree with a glass of egg nog and roar­ing fire, step­ping out­side at mid­night to hear the quiet, look at the stars, and imag­ine what that Beth­le­hem night must have been like.

I also love to be near the ocean any time of the year. So it would be equally lovely to rent a house on the beach and spend the evening the same way, except that it would be the smell of the salt air and sound of the waves that would enchant me in the wee small hours.

And Christ­mas Day? I think it would be delight­ful to open presents and enjoy a big, hearty brunch, lin­ger­ing at the table to raise a mimosa to the mem­o­ries of Christ­mases past spent with loved ones with whom we will even­tu­ally be reunited. An after­noon of read­ing, relax­ing, and nap­ping with car­ols play­ing softly might be just the ticket!

How­ever I com­mem­o­rate Christ­mas this year, it will be a dif­fer­ent kind of cel­e­bra­tion, designed to embrace the free­dom I have dis­cov­ered — from oblig­a­tion, rep­e­ti­tion of mun­dane ser­vices and ser­mons recy­cled by tired pas­tors, and feel­ing exhausted after­ward from hav­ing served, but not really worshiped.

This year, I will cel­e­brate boldly and freely in the pres­ence of the Divine Cre­ator — con­fi­dent that my praises and prayers will be heard and answered.

So maybe I am ready to deal with those Christ­mas cards, after all, and plan a won­der­ful new way of singing “glory to the new­born King!”

For that, I am extremely thank­ful this Thursday!

What are you thank­ful for today? Leave a com­ment and link to your Thank­ful Thurs­day post! And, as always, thanks to Iris for being our won­der­ful host!

Tech­no­rati Tags: Thank­ful Thursday