2008 Advent Calendar | Day 24 | Irene Brand

Family Traditions

My focus on family traditions has changed frequently over the years.  During my childhood, when we lived on the farm, my mother would order our gifts from a Sears Roebuck catalog, and we never expected more than one gift. It was always a pleasure when my brother and I searched for a Christmas tree. We always chose a Virginia cedar from our farm.  We stored our ornaments in a large box in an upstairs closet and we used the same ones every year.  We didn’t have electric tree lights. We always opened our gifts on Christmas Eve, and this is a custom the extended family still observes.

The programs at church and at our one-room school were the highlight of the Christmas season, and from an early age, we knew the real meaning of Christmas.  And the box of hard candy was always welcome, for we didn’t have candy available as it is now. As a child, I was one of the participants in the programs, but for years now, I’ve directed the Christmas programs. We used to have dramas only, but we now have a musical program with drama that shows the impact of the music presentation.

Our extended family still gathers on Christmas Day.  It’s a day of feasting as well as a time to share in the joy of family.

Jesus is the Reason for the Season!

Not only is Jesus my Savior, He’s my friend, confidant, guide, sustainer, enabler, and I could go on and on.

While it is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus that guaranteed our salvation, still it’s humbling to think that God had enough faith in His creation, that he allowed His Son to  become flesh and blood like the rest of us.  Because of the earthly body of Jesus that experienced the temptations, physical ailments and day-by-day difficulties as humans experience, we know that He can identify with our failures and frailities.

Each year as we remember and portray His humble beginnings in a Behtlehem manger, I’m reminded over and over of God’s love for us.  While it’s true that Christmas is a time for family, still I consider it a day to rejoice in the truth of God’s concern for all mankind.  My favorite Christmas Scripture is Galatians 4:4-5.  “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” (KJV)

The assurance that God knew the right time to send the Savior has always been comforting to me.  It assures me that in His time, our Father will send everything else that I need.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Irene Brand became one of the early pioneers of inspirational fiction when she signed a contract with Thomas Nelson Publishers to write one of the four launch titles in their Cherish Romances series in 1984.  Her first fiction book, A Change of Heart, was followed the next year by A Mighty Flame.   She has continued steady publishing since that time. The publication of her December, 2008 book , Love Finds You in VALENTINE Nebraska, (Summerside Press) will mark her 45th book.  In addition to her single-title books, with approximately two million copies in print, her work has appeared in novella anthologies and other book collections.

Actively involved in the ministry of her local Baptist Church, where she’s been a member since she was a child, she currently serves as a Sunday school teacher, pianist, choir director, treasurer and an active member of the women’s mission society.

Irene lives at Southside, West Virginia (five miles from her birthplace) with her husband, Rod.  They have traveled together to thirty-five foreign countries and all fifty of the United States.

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