The Best Gift This Christmas

The presents are wrapped and placed neatly under the tree. The kids are all tucked in for the night and you and your wife sit down on the couch for what seems like the first time this week. It’s Christmas Eve and you’re exhausted. Shopping for presents and food have absolutely drained you and the couch feels like home. With a fire lit and a drink in hand, you sigh and breathe in your first breath of freedom. In anticipation, you dream of what tomorrow may bring for your children, and then your wife asks you a question: “Can we go on vacation?”

You respond with a, “sure”. Except you haven’t done that for years, and your wife is absolutely on her last legs. This isn’t a story of women caring for kids, but rather a family that seems right on the outside, but on the inside cries aloud for something deeper and more significant.

Your wife isn’t asking for fun; she’s asking for time. 

In the hurried life of ministry, we often forget that the first priority of ministry is not the church we serve, but rather the people we live with. That’s why the Bible is so apt to point out the priority of raising children in the way they should go and that the bottom line mark of a good parent is a child grown, following the Lord.

Your family is the most important ministry you will ever have. Your greatest legacy will be what you did with the people closest to you.

Allow this post to hit you hard this week, and help you focus on the reason we do Christmas together: family. We don’t long just for individuals to come back home to Jesus; we long for families to create generational change, where everyone can come back home. One is good; everyone is better.

But if you can’t find the time for your family, this will never happen, and your legacy will be null. Therefore, this Christmas week, please take the time to STOP, focus on JESUS, and bring your FAMILY back home to Him.

Give your wife the vacation she deserves, and give your family the time they so desperately need.