Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, Easter.That's my list of favorite holidays, from first to last. I love Christmas, the presents, the anticipation. I love giving and the anticipation of seeing the person open the gift I've gotten them, too. Thankgiving is great, love the food and the nap that comes soon afterwards. Halloween- I don't know what it is about that time of year. Some people would bet their last penny on the fact that Halloween is rooted in the devil himself and thus should be disregarded at all costs, but if it involves candy and a time of year where you get to hear the crunching of leaves under foot, I'm all for it. But Easter? The Easter Bunny was always a dumb idea to me, as far as I remember. I might have believed in him or her at some point, but I don't remember it. The only anticipation I remember feeling on Easter mornings is one of anguish- why in the world would someone make it so that there was church on a holiday? How much of a worse idea could a person have? Of course, there's the Easter egg hunt in the early morning and an Easter basket with candy and usually one present to check out... but then it's time to get dressed in a suit (something I hate) and head out to the Sunday morning service for an hour and a half before running out the church doors and ripping off the tie, happy to be getting home to change into a t-shirt and jeans. To be honest, I was always afraid Christmas would fall on a Sunday. It almost did a few years back, but leap year caused it to skip from Saturday to Monday. I knew if it was on a Sunday, I would have to rush and open my presents in the early morning, get on some nice clothes, and spend the morning and early afternoon in church. In a book by a guy named Rob Bell he talks about the founding of the church he started, Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He says that when they started it they wanted people to wake up on Sunday morning and say "What do I want to do more than anything else in the world this morning? How about go to church?" Why isn't it like that everywhere? Shouldn't it be as exciting to go to church as it is to get or give presents or eat food? The thing is that we don't really see holidays as religious or anything like that, we see them as days in which we can get something out of it, whether it's a good feeling from giving someone something or getting something ourselves. Reality is that church does often fall short for me but when it comes to the reality of the crucifixion and death of Christ, that's real stuff. The nails were real, the blood was real, the pain was real. I may have hated the idea of going to church on a holiday, and I still think through those same thoughts every year. But the reality is that there is something beyond church- something tangible that exists beyond four walls and it's called Christ. Find him today, seek him out. He is waiting.... By the way, if you didn't get what that last post was all about, I'm moving to Alger Heights, Michigan. I don't know when, don't ask me. And I don't know why. But I think the major part of the move is over a church. -Josh | 
