If you read my blog last December, then you are aware I did not celebrate Christmas 2013 in my usual way. Nope. Christmas 2013 found me nursing a broken left hip, courtesy of a freak fall I took November 30, 2013, in a Tallahassee, Florida gas station while trying, unsuccessfully, to contain a very skittish Bear.

As a result of the fall, emergency surgery was performed at our final destination, Waycross, Georgia, December 1, 2013.

Fortunately, I had all my December posts written and in place before we started our trip.

As I sat on the couch last December and re-read everything I’d written as the posts came out, I was forced to ponder several things. Primary among the ponderings was do I believe what I write to be true?

During a season where we did not put up a tree because my walker couldn’t get around it, and decorations were very limited…presents were gift cards, because I hadn’t done my shopping before Thanksgiving…highly anticipated events — there were three big ones, several smaller ones — were missed because I just didn’t have the strength to handle them…and, I was unable to bake my favorite Christmas dessert…in light of all of this do I really, truly, believe Christmas is about the cross?

Oh, and did I mention Pilot came down with a stomach virus the second week of December, mere days after we returned home from Georgia, yet found the strength to get to the guest room to help me when I muttered to myself I’m stuck, as I floundered like a turtle on its back trying to get out of the bed?

Or tell you about the disastrous two-week dishwasher delivery that began the day after we returned?

Or tell you about the washing machine drain that backed up and gushed water all over the laundry room floor?

Or relate the tale of the two-month-long-delayed foundation repairs to our house?

For me, although I was surrounded by God’s daily mercies, no matter how hard I tried, it was a struggle not to let the disappointments that abounded sink me into a deep, dark, depression.

So I pondered…

Do I really believe what posted December 3, 2013?

Just as God heard the cries of his people all those years ago, he hears our cries today. Jesus is as real today, as he was yesterday, and as he will be tomorrow. He is our deliverer. Only he can remove our shackles.

Do I really believe what posted December 5, 2013?

What if there was someone we could hand all our problems and cares over to, and he’d take care of everything. He’d walk along beside us, and support us every second of every day. And give us peace in the process. Wouldn’t we want to be around him?

Do I really believe what posted December 12, 2013?

Just as God used these five women, he can use us. We can all be redeemed, and put back together through his grace. All we have to do is have faith enough to say yes to God, and his son, Jesus Christ.

Do I really believe what posted December 19, 2013?

God continues to use his people to accomplish his plans. We won’t give birth to the Messiah, but like Mary, we carry Christ inside us, through the power of the Holy Spirit. Once we claim Jesus as our LORD and Savior, it then becomes our responsibility to praise God for the great things he has done for us through his love, mercy and grace, and share that wonder with those around us.

Most importantly, do I believe what I penned sometime in September, 2013, that posted December 24, 2013?

Next to the manger scene I set up each December, hangs a cross, and a crown of thorns. Lest I get caught up in the presents, the baking, the decorations, and the carols, I need a reminder in front of me. Christmas is about much more than a baby, gifts, and family. Christmas is about the cross. It’s about the sacrifice, the suffering, and the Savior who died and rose again so we might live.

Yes. Yes I do believe the truth Jesus led me to write months before I stared up at the clouds from a parking lot in Tallahassee, Florida.

Even though Christmas 2013 has come and gone, and Christmas 2014 will soon be a memory, no matter where life might find us right now, I hope we all believe this Christmas and every Christmas that follows…it’s about the cross.

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This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.             John 3:16-17 (MSG)