Friday, December 26, 2008

December 2nd and my Christmas Music

It's the day after Christmas, so I thought I would share a bit about my Christmas music addiction.

December 2nd is the day Christmas season officially starts in our home. My son's birthday is on the 1st, so we give our son the focus before we decorate and play our favorite Christmas tunes. I know many people start way sooner and stores bust out their stuff the day after Halloween. My problem is I always have to refrain from playing Christmas music when Thanksgiving comes and goes. It might seem strange, but I really like Christmas music. I have about 15 CDs of the stuff and every year I seek out at least one new one. Now I know you think that most Christmas music they play on the radio is horrible. Unless it's oldies, I do agree. But the stuff I have rarely does get general market radio play. This year at work Sabrina and her co-workers were annoyed constantly about the horrible "Christmas" music that is piped in at Verizon. They usually turned it down. Finally Sabrina took some songs and put it onto a memory card and they got to enjoy about an hour or so of real good Christmas music. Funny thing is they can play a type of Christmas music but can't say Merry Christmas.

If I was allowed to I could play Christmas all year round. I cannot pinpoint on when I got "addicted" to it, but when December 2nd rolls around, I load all the CDs onto itunes and pick my favorites and put it on my ipod. It might be unusual to see me rocking out to Christmas music, since my style is the more raaaar kind of stuff. There are rock bands that take traditional songs and make it there own style, but I do enjoy the soothing soft tune about our Saviors birth. I am even playing it now as I type out this post. The main CDs I enjoy are put out through the years, by Tooth & Nail Records or BEC Recordings (Happy Christmas Vol.1-4 and X Christmas). Various artists from their labels and a tiny bit from others, get together and record their favorite Christmas songs or sometimes they write a new one. No matter what style I tend to enjoy them all. Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby and the like are hard to find cheap, so I only have a sample of their stuff. If I could I would love to get every Christmas CD I ever wanted. I don't like the chorus, orchestra,country, unnamed artist compilations, Lennon/Oko, and most general market radio wannabe Christmas CDs. Other than that I like tons of Christmas music.

HAPPY BOXING DAY!! The Christmas music by the way gets packed up on New Years Day. That's our boxing day.

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Baby Jesus: How special was his birth?

I put this is a little newsletter article to the youth, I thought I would share it with you. I will continue to elaborated on Christmas even. It obviously will go beyond Christmas, but the celebrated of Jesus' birth should not go beyond one day.


Prophecies fulfilled, a miracle birth celebrated like no other, gifts given fit for a king. So fragile and small, the child could do nothing, but eat, sleep and cry. But this one child would be celebrated and revered by so many. One man would live until he saw this baby (Luke 1:25). This child was also a fugitive of a king, but wise men still sought him (Matthew 2). The story of His birth has been told to many from His first day on earth and will be continued to be told to many more. Songs, plays, movies, and many more presentations, tell of His birth in some way. His actual day of birth is not clear, but one day was chosen to celebrate it.
December 25th and the season leading up to it, is celebrated around the world by many walks of life, on every continent. No other birth is more celebrated and told of than the Birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It is seriously amazingly ridiculous that one child would have such an impact on the world, before he was even a year old. His birth so celebrated, is also unforgettable by the fact that it shows how it was a start to how He lived and died, and then conquered death for us all, that too is seriously amazingly ridiculous!!!
I hope you to will celebrate His birth thinking about how special it was. I hope you will also celebrate His birth beyond the CHRISTmas Season.