Is it already December?

Really? I can hardly believe it...

I've done more cooking in the last 2 weeks than I have in the last 2 months...so I'm feeling incredibly accomplished. Especially since my dad and my brother are a captive audience and don't have a choice about whether they eat my cooking =P

Christmas has been wonderful--relaxing, slow, and peaceful, which is just how I like it. Got up late, drank coffee and hung out with dad and bro, worked a little on a unit on evolution and Creation (yea, I know I'm a nerd), went for a walk next to the river outside my dad's place (it's COLD here! I've never been so bundled up and yet still so cold...), came home and cooked dinner (stuffed cornish game hens!), then played Clue (muahaha, I won) and watched part of Charlie Wilson's War (my dad, the computer scientist, is a history nerd. Who would have known?). I couldn't have asked for a nicer Christmas.

I have so many things to thank God for this year (does this ever change? No--because God doesn't change and his mercies are new every morning)--food, friends, family, health, my job, my church...

But ultimately, these things are all of the world, and however good they may be, they pale in comparison to the fact that God has given me something much more precious than any material thing in this universe. I know it's probably the most oft-quoted verse in Scripture, but here it is:

For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. (John 3:16-17)

The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. (John 3:35)

God not only loves us, but He loves His Son--and yet, He sacrificed His Son on my behalf. And because of Christ's death and resurrection from the dead and (by God's grace) my faith in Christ, God's righteous wrath over MY sin doesn't remain on me. I don't have to pay the penalty for my own sin because God's Son paid the penalty instead, even though he was completely undeserving of punishment. It's not fair, but it's wonderful, and so often I get wrapped up in the details of my own life that I take this for granted.