Less than three days until Christmas and I still don’t have all my shopping done.\u00a0 Right now it’s down to two of the most difficult gifts I buy every year.\u00a0\u00a0 Something for my Mom and Dad.\u00a0 From the discussions I have had with others, I can tell there are many\u00a0in the same situation.\u00a0 Parents are just tough to buy for, and here is a clue why that is.\u00a0 They’re older.<\/p>\n
I don’t mean that in a bad way.\u00a0 I just\u00a0mean they are ahead of me.\u00a0 Most of the\u00a0“toys” I can think of are in the “been-there-done-that” category for my Dad.\u00a0 If he needs it, and I can afford it, he probably already has it.\u00a0 If he doesn’t have it, it’s because he hasn’t thought of it.\u00a0 And if he hasn’t thought of it, I probably haven’t either,\u00a0because when it comes to gadgets, we’re just too much alike.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Every year I call and ask Dad what he wants for Christmas.\u00a0 Sometimes he lists a\u00a0\u00a0piddly thing or two\u00a0that us kids fight over to see who can get it first.\u00a0\u00a0 But usually, he just says something about being glad to see us and anything will do.\u00a0\u00a0 I’m\u00a0beginning to believe him.\u00a0 It’s me he loves.\u00a0 Not the gadgets I give him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It occurs to me that our Heavenly Father probably views things in a similar way.\u00a0\u00a0 I suspect there is not much I could give\u00a0Him that He really needs.\u00a0 The gifts of money, time and service I offer are only an indication of the real thing He wants: \u00a0Me.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
So Dad, this Christmas, you and my Heavenly Father may both\u00a0get something you already have.\u00a0\u00a0 When you open the present and pull out the gadget, you may not find it very useful.\u00a0 You may\u00a0need to return it,\u00a0stash it in the closet, or even re-gift it.\u00a0 But when you do, consider\u00a0it a sign of something else you both already have:\u00a0 My love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Less than three days until Christmas and I still don’t have all my shopping done.\u00a0 Right now it’s down to two of the most difficult gifts I buy every year.\u00a0\u00a0 Something for my Mom and Dad.\u00a0 From the discussions I have had with others, I can tell there are many\u00a0in the same situation.\u00a0 Parents are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-misc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=230"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":253,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230\/revisions\/253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}