I remember the simple days of old when all I wanted for Christmas was my two front teeth. Those days seem to have been lost somewhere away in a manger as I hustle around to deck the halls. The first Noel of my simple childhood has gone fum, fum, fum from any detailed recollection and now I find my mind fighting to grasp some wonder here in the bleak midwinter.

So I sit here replaying in my head the fact that love came down at Christmas because Mary had a baby. But these taxing twelve days of Christmas somehow make me wonder if this really is the most wonderful time of the year. My wife calls it Giftmas, which is far from a misnomer in light of all of us walking in a winter wonderland in search of silver bells and jingle bells while dancing to the merry Christmas polka. (and, yes, that's the name of a carol, look it up!)

So many of us are rockin' around the Christmas tree trying not to step on the mounds of presents that inhabit our Toyland when all the while Suzy Snowflake is falling outside pure and white in hopes of reminding us that angels from the realms of glory once declared the birth of that infant holy, infant lowly.

I heard the bells on Christmas day again this year and they begged me to cry 'joy to the world.' But how far it is to Bethlehem from where we live our typical, self absorbed lives. Yet, this idea came upon a midnight clear to me in these first hours of the O Holy Night. The idea that we should rejoice and be merry by intentional focus this year.

My first intention is to listen anew for the angels we have heard on high and ask myself afresh, 'what child is this?' For only in pondering these mysteries, do I again feel the bells ding dong merrily on high. But hey, ho, nobody's home in most people's minds on these deeper meanings but I'm hoping to capture the imaginations of a few of you.

How wonderful would it be to march to the beat of my own little drummer boy again? To throw off the oppression of possessions and gift getting for the peace of that silent night, holy night. Because lo, how a rose e'er blooming at Christmas can change us if given some import above Frosty the snowman and his entourage of make believe characters that have somehow overtaken Jesu, joy of man's desiring, as our idea of a white Christmas.

Still, all is not lost on this sleigh ride. It's true. We need a little Christmas for sure; not the up-on-the-house-top, pour the wish list gifts down the chimney kind of Christmas. We need a re-thought, re-focused, wonder filled, O come O come Emmanuel kind of Christmas.

So God rest ye merry, gentlemen and ladies. Christ is born in Bethlehem. O come all ye faithful for this journey over the river and through the woods back to the truest meaning for all seasons: not that Santa Clause is coming to town but that we have peace in knowing that once there was a birthday of a King.