Christmas with friends

Our first Christmas in this town, with new friends, new families. Last weekend, we went to a party organized by our Bible study group. I learned a new gift exchange game called white elephant gift exchange. Everyone who came brought a wrapped gift that we put under the Christmas tree. We then picked a number and that determined the order to pick a gift. D got number 7 (his favorite number) and I got number 9. The person who got #1 picked a gift first. Then the person with #2 could either steal the gift from #1 (then #1 had to pick another gift) or pick one under the tree, and so on. One gift could only be stolen twice.

I have mixed reactions to this exchange. So here's my preaching of it. :)

I like how we all that came to the party learn to appreciate gifts, whatever they are. I increasingly learn about the importance of appreciating gifts from the church I've been studying closely. The pastor always says to his staff members whose job is opening all the offering money, "Do not ever, even in your heart, undermine or mock whatever amount or thing you see when opening the offering bucket. It might be their last money, or the most precious thing in their possession. You never know, and you'd better not make fun of it." So in the white elephant exchange, when we got a simple gift, or our gift was stolen, and we got a gift that (in our mind) was not as good as what we brought or what was stolen, we all need to appreciate, appreciate, appreciate. I also learned to be careful of what we said when opening gifts. Not that we all had to be hypocrites and said we liked something when we did not. Again it all came back from a heart that appreciates. When we appreciate gifts, the feeling will flow through all that we say. Honestly, I don't want to be someone who opened the gift, found a Christmas ornament in the form of a star and then said "what is this? I can't use it" only to find out later that someone else made the star for days with their hands.

Stealing the gifts was the fun part of the game, obviously. After all that was how we learned to appreciate gifts, right? It was fun to see what gifts got stolen often: kitchen tools, Michael W Smith's Christmas CD, Kathryn Stockett's The Help, and movie theater gift cards that D and I brought! At the same time, I disliked when people stole others' gifts right even after seeing how their eyes glowed after opening their gifts. For example, when a pregnant lady got a travel neck pillow (that she obviously, assuredly loved) and someone stole it from her? Or when, after receiving Stockett's The Help and someone announced "Oh my, this is the book I've always wanted to read!" and then the next person just had to steal it right away. Oh my. Hopes are crushed at times. I hope I don't crush people's hopes without knowing that those people will get something much better, or without myself giving them what they hope for.