“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” – CS Lewis

For some, the Christmas and holiday season are a bleak reminder of a broken heart.

A time of loneliness and melancholy for loved ones no longer with us.

A time to wish for one more chance, one more memory, one more “I love you” or “Merry Christmas”.

Sadness and heartache are real.

They are a price to be paid for loving another human being.

When I think of others going through times like this, I always go back to this quote from CS Lewis.

I’m not sure why it has to work like this, but I believe he explains how it does work.

We must choose between allowing our hearts to harden and turn to stone, or wade into the dangerous waters of vulnerability.

I know this is easier said than done and that compared to a broken heart some may wish for a heart of stone, but my sincerest wish is that even the broken hearted can find hope in CS Lewis’s words.

Hope and faith that real love is worth the heart ache. That a heart of stone is something we would not wish on our worst enemies.

This is part of the magic of Christmas. We are reminded to believe in love. To hope for what can be and to have faith that love will win out in the end.

As a Christian, this is the true meaning of Christmas. God loved us. God sent his son to live and then die on the cross in exchange for us. Love, God and Jesus won out in the end.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

I like to compare the holiday season with the way a child listens to a favorite story. The pleasure is in the familiar way the story begins, the anticipation of familiar turns it takes, the familiar moments of suspense, and the familiar climax and ending.

Fred Rogers

What a great way to describe the holiday season.

Let’s enjoy the anticipation around the familiar turns of the Christmas season.

Decorating the house.

Shopping for presents.

Christmas plays and programs.

Our favorite Christmas movies.

Christmas church.

Wrapping and opening presents.

Quiet time with loved ones after all the hullabaloo.

Whatever your familiar moments, enjoy them.

Make it a great Christmas season.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

https://youtu.be/IMUSit6KBfk?si=PSEZOKkahuqdHJ3e

Drove a thousand miles, just to see you smile.

Christmas is about baby Jesus.

Right after that is spending time with those we love.

Laughing, smiling and showing each other God’s love.

In the midst of all the running around and busyness of the season – make room for those you love.

Genuinely be in the moment. Focused only on your love for them.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.

The above is the very beginning of the movie “Love, Actually” (a Christmas favorite at our house).

It’s a great reminder that love is all around us.

Sometimes we forget.

Sometimes we let ourselves fall into the trap of thinking only of ourselves. We forget that we are happiest and at our best when we are loving others.

At Christmas we are reminded of these simple truths.

Keep the Christmas mojo going on past Christmas this year. Keep the feelings of love and selflessness at the forefront – where they belonged all along.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Resent from a couple of years ago.

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

“The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbor’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken.” – C S Lewis

CS Lewis always seems to get me with his challenges to humility.

This one in particular seemed a particular challenge.

I’m hoping that Christmas will inspire me to take on this challenge this year. To be focused on the glory of my neighbor. To put others always above myself in my daily to dos.

At Mavidea and Maxlider we’re lucky enough to have customers and coworkers to work with. They provide a daily opportunity to work towards the ideal described above.

The end of the year will go quickly. It will be easy to slip into ego, pride and selfishness as we go about our work.

Don’t fall in to the trap. Don’t let your back be broken with pride.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

No one has ever loved anyone the way everyone wants to be loved. – Mignon McLaughlin

At first I read this as a negative. Kind of a dark version of “all is lost, why even try”.

But then I realized two things.

First, all relationships require grace. Thinking the best of our loved ones even though they can and will let us down.

Second, the kind of love we all want only comes from God. God alone is perfect in His love for us. He is unwavering and flawless in how He loves each and every one of us.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

I always wanted to be somebody, but now I realize I should have been more specific. – Lily Tomlin

Reminder for today – be specific with your goals and dreams.

Write them down.

Speak them out loud to someone you trust.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

https://youtu.be/gtM8BRF7Bd0

I’ve probably sent this song out every Christmas season even though it probably isn’t on many Christmas playlists.

To me it tells the story of the season and the story behind Christmas as well as any traditional Christmas song.

The story of Jesus and his birth told against the backdrop of God’s plan for all of humankind is the whole point of Christmas.

It’s easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of Christmas with all of the to dos and happenings, but it’s important to reminder the bigger story.

That God sent his one and only son to live and die for you and wants to live in you for the rest of your days here and forever with you in Heaven.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

As costly as it was in the lives of our men and women in uniform, in military assets, and in esteem and pride, Pearl Harbor was a watershed moment for America. – Joe Baca

Today is the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor – each year on this day I try to reflect again on that generation and what they have done for us.

I found this paragraph in a blog while reading about “The Greatest Generation”:

“The Bible instructs us to give honor to whom honor is due (Rom. 13:7). Surely this passing generation of ordinary people who did extraordinary things deserves our gratitude and recognition. They won history’s worst war and saved the world. They built the America you and I know and benefit from every day. They may very well be, as Tom Brokaw calls them, “the greatest generation any society has ever produced.”

I am not a historian and so I won’t argue whether or not they were, in fact, “the greatest generation”.

I will agree they were great though.

And the reason I think so is because they gave so much.

They gave their friends, brothers, and sisters in a great war so that the world would remain free.

They gave their youth in service to their country.

They gave their all in rebuilding after the war.

If you ask me, all of that adds up to greatness.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.

Conflict cannot survive without your participation. – Wayne Dyer

Dale Carnegie advises – the best way to win an argument is to not have one (paraphrased).

It’s so easy to let our pride get the best of us. Our desire to win or look important trumps the really important stuff.

Jesus asked us to “turn the other cheek” and to “love our enemies.”

And he said these things for our own good.

Not for those we forgive or love.

But for us. To become the kind of person whose response to an argument or difficulty is to offer love in return.

Decide what kind of person you want to be. Pay attention next time argument or conflict is about to get the better of you.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The content of this email is confidential and intended for the recipient specified in message only. It is strictly forbidden to share any part of this message with any third party, without a written consent of the sender. If you received this message by mistake, please reply to this message and follow with its deletion, so that we can ensure such a mistake does not occur in the future.