I really don't know what happened to me in November. I entered the Twilight Zone or something, I'm sure of it. My blog was doing so well, I was getting new readers, then I vanished from the face of HSB. Or so it seems. I took a chance that I might lose readers, and I really shouldn't do that!

Life has a way of eclipsing our priorities, doesn't it? The urgent, stressful things clamor, scream, and whine for attention, while the stuff we really should be focusing on starts to wither.

To be blunt, I spent November stressing about money. With four kids, a dwindling income (or so it felt), bills, braces for one child and another needing them...and Thanksgiving, an anniversary, and Christmas looming on the horizon, I became very stressed (still feeling it, actually). But all the while, the Lord was there, saying, "Focus on Me. Put Me first. Everything else will fall into place."

I'm still waiting for everything to fall into place, because, ashamedly, I haven't been putting Him first. The noise of the stress and anxiety I was facing was drowning out His quiet reminder. It takes real discipline, apparently, to take your eyes off the bills that are due and look instead to the One Who "owns the cattle on a thousand hills."

The holidays can be very difficult for many people. For quite a few, stressing about finances completely wipes out any joy we may otherwise feel. For others, missing a loved one who's passed on makes this season a bleak one. I'll be addressing this in the next issue of the Homeschooling Anyway newsletter, and giving some ideas on how to put the joy back into your Christmas. (You can sign up by clicking the link at the top of this page.)

But for now, I'd like to leave you with some verses that the Lord keeps bringing to mind. I need to print them out and post them above my desk. (Out of sight, out of mind!) I hope they'll encourage you, too, to put Christ first, not just at Christmas, but always, and in everything.

Deuteronomy 28:1-14 

Isaiah 58:6-11 

Jeremiah 17:5-8

Malachi 3:6-18

2 Corinthians 9:6-15