I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving last year. I was an idiot.

I found myself hovering around the electronics department at the most jam-packed store in the county at 6:00 in the morning. I was waiting for them to dole out the bargain of the season–some goofy electronic toy-thingy that I didn’t even know how to operate. The real problem was that when they finally did start rationing out the toys, I couldn’t lift a hand to snag one. Both arms were pinned by the other zombie parents with that look that said “Why am I spending a vacation day coming here in the middle of the night to save twenty bucks on a toy I don’t even really like?” I decided later I’d pay the twenty extra bucks not to have to go through that again. Would you believe a lady actually passed out in the aisle? No kidding! She literally shopped ’til she dropped.

When I was asking my kids what they might like this year for Christmas a few weeks ago, I started feeling a little like a waitress at a fastfood restaurant. Even though I determined to work to keep the season from becoming one of those clown-head Christmases, I found myself fighting the urge to add “Would you like fries with that?”

But Jesus asks in Matthew 16:26, “What will a man be profited, if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?”

Working to gain material things at the expense of everything spiritual will end up with a net gain of zero at the end of life. In the same way, what will it profit my children or me if we spend all our Christmas energies scrambling for material things? It can cost us the very heart and soul of Christmas.

The heart of Christmas is the celebration of God becoming man to pay our sin debt and purchase our eternity. That’s the kind of profit we need to focus on this season. We can do that through staying faithful in reading his Word and in staying on our knees in prayer. A “shop ’til you drop” season won’t bring the satisfaction that a “stop ’til you drop to you knees” season will. And you can most likely remain conscious. To say the very least, it’s all that and a bag of fries!

Rhonda Rhea rrhea@juno.com