i've tried everything to get into the christmas spirit this year, but to no avail.

i've attended several festive parties. written countless christmas cards. downloaded a buttload of christmas tunes and ordered one too many egg nog chais. i even went as far as to play a few rounds of the christmas edition of angry birds, but even that didn't seem to work. like many others, i'm having a hard time believing christmas is a few days away due to the lack of fluffy white stuff outside.

that, and my heart is much bigger than the amount of money in my wallet.

i hate the fact that i haven't been able to shower my family and friends with gifts this year. i know that christmas isn't about gifts and that you can show the people in your life that you love them in other ways, but man does it ever suck when you have all of these thoughtful present ideas floating around in your head and no way of getting your hands on them.

but here i was belting out a few of my favourite carols in church the other day with a few hundred strangers and - BOOM - the christmas spirit was upon me. i don't know what it was, really. perhaps it was the catchy drum beat, or the fact that i was surrounded by a plethora of red and green paraphernalia - or maybe, just maybe, it was the powerful truth found in the songs that we were singing. songs like 'oh come let us adore him' and 'go tell it on the mountain'...

songs that remind me that the true meaning of christmas isn't about snow, or even presents, but christ.

merry christmas, friends!