"Elfing"

One of my very favorite things about Christmas is the chance to do "elfing." It is an important part of any Christmas. Elfing is basically anything that is done as a surprise for someone else. So, it includes the shopping (which is okay, but not my favorite form of elfing) and then the wrapping, delivering, etc. Tonight Michael and I did the elfing for the families that we adopted for Christmas. We sorted all of the toys first by family, and then by child. Then, we wrapped them all up. The kids will help with putting on the bows on Monday. (Yes mom, we will have them all out of the dining room before you come home.)

As I was writing out all of the tags, I wrote the child's name in the To: part, and then wrote "Jesus" in the From: section. About halfway through all of the wrapping, it hit me that this was part of fulfilling the covenant I made to act in His name, and to always remember Him. I know that this is the true meaning of Christmas, that acting in the ways that Christ would act if He was here is why we give gifts, and why we are supposed to go outside of our own small piece of the world, and look for others that need our help. Isn't it cool that He loves us enough to let us act in His name. Isn't it important that we do it?