And a little child will lead them.

Isaiah 11:6 says, "...and a little child will lead them." That is what we celebrate at Christmas. A little child is the whole reason we celebrate Christmas. Though we have all but taken out Jesus from our American Christmas, it was true for me this year.

As every other year, we've had things to do to get ready for all of our Christmas events that we will go to in the next few days. Presents for everybody, videos made, presents wrapped, food prepared, and all the other stuff that goes into getting ready for Christmas. Bottom line, that consumes all of my efforts that I have left after work. I don't imagine that's much different from anyone else.

But this is the first year that Nathan has really been able to enjoy Christmas. Last year, at 8 months, he was crawling, but certainly not really able to take in what's going on around him. This year, however, we went to see the drumline at Bellevue Square. Which he loved! Of course, he pretty much thinks he's a professional drummer already. Then of course, there's the tree lights. But the little nativities around the house are what seems to be capturing him the most this year. We have the new Veggie Tales nativity set (picture above) which we all love. Who doesn't like vegetables dressed up as Jesus, Mary, Joseph, the cow, the palm tree, etc. But we also have the big people's nativity set up, among many others.

He'll push the stool over to our hutch, climb up, and stare into the nativity. He'll call one of us over and point to the baby and say, "Jesus", then he says, "Mommy" as he points to Mary, and "Daddy" as he points to Joseph. It's not the fact that he can point out the characters that struck me. It's the fact that he climbs up to the nativity two or three times a day, every single day. I might glance at the nativity and notice that it's there and that's about the extent of it. But Nathan seems to want to enter into what is going on in this scene. This is the part of Christmas that we often forget until the night Christmas Eve when all of the stress and preparation has died off. But Nathan... he sees it every day. And that is what he taught me this year.

So when seeing this verse in Isaiah 11:6, to me, not only is it referring to Jesus who came to lead us, it's also reminding me that Nathan has led me deeper into Christmas this year by being in awe of what I forget that I should stand in awe of.