Every year it seems that my birthday (Dec. 10) falls on a pretty inconvenient day.  Specifically due to the fact that the second week of December is usually when final exams and projects begin to come due at school, I can "fondly" remember many birthdays when the day's activities consisted mainly of sitting in class, working on group presentations, or studying.  But not so this year!  Oh no, as far as school was concerned, this year I was home free from any assignments or exams on my birthday.  But, of course, fate (or perhaps just the calendar) decided to try a new one on me this year . . . . Wednesday night youth group.  Impact, to be exact.  Now, I had noticed that December 10th fell on a Wednesday sometime back in August when I was first planning the fall youth schedule, so my sharp mind being what it was (remember, I was a year younger back then), I made a quick and easy decision . . . . why not use youth group that night to throw myself the biggest, funnest (yeah, yeah, I know) birthday party that I can whip up.  Three and a half months later, that's exactly where I stood - in the middle of the Family Life Center, surrounded by Middle School students and leaders, dodgeballs and chatter bouncing off the walls, and thinking that I had made a very good decision.

It's an interesting thing about birthdays, you know . . . . . once you hit a certain age (and I know people will say I'm not that old!), it's like the anticipation for them that you had as a kid kind of goes away.  No longer are you counting down the days on the calendar until that glorious day when you turn one year older.  In fact, we often do the opposite - not really telling anyone that our birthday is coming up, treating it like it's really no big deal.  Of course, Facebook has made this a much more difficult task than what it once was, but even so, it seems that the desire to fully publicize your upcoming birthday sort of dwindles as you get older, doesn't it?  So we go on pretending that there isn't this special day coming up that is designed to celebrate us.  But then, something happens.  You wake up one morning and it actually is your birthday.  And everything seems different.  The sun seems brighter, the tasks of the day have a new optimism about them, things just seem to be good . . . . they seem to be about you.  And then you start to wonder if people know it is your birthday, don't you?  You start to hope that they found out.  And you start to think that maybe, just around the next corner, there will be a big surprise party with all your closest friends and everyone will be laughing and excited and having a great time.  And you will feel special.  Because they remembered.

I wonder if that's how Jesus felt when the calendar rolled around to his birthday as well.  Clearly he had birthdays - he lived on this earth for 30-some years.  Whether or not he had birthday parties I don't know, but you gotta wonder if there wasn't some part of him that knew that it was his special day, even if nobody else around him seemed to have any idea.  And can you imagine how people would have acted if they did know?!  Now that's a party!  (Kind of puts our Impact Middle School party to shame, even as fun as it was . . . . ).

Sometimes, especially around this time of year when both my own birthday and Jesus' birthday draw my attention, I need to remind myself not to fall into this "birthday trap" - not to treat Christmas with the same indifference that I sometimes have as my own birthday approaches.  Not to let the "it's no big deal, Christmas comes around every year" attitude slip into my heart and my mind.  Because you know what?  It is a big deal.  Jesus' birthday is one of the biggest deals there is . . . . (Even bigger than Black Friday . . . . haha . . . . sorry, that was lame) . . . . It's an event that deserves our attention.  Because no matter how much we may minimize it or pretend it's not important, when we wake up on Christmas morning, everything seems different.  Everything is different.  Because we are celebrating the birth of our Savior, and there's nothing insignificant about that.  I'd say it's even worth a party . . . .

- Topher