“Freely you have received, freely give.”
MATTHEW 10:8
Patricia Moss listened to her children whine and cry in the toy department over which toy they’d get at Christmas and watched the pushing and shoving of the department store crowds. Then she stepped back for a minute to examine her family’s values.
She decided to adopt a friend’s tradition originating from the song, “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” Beginning early in fall, she would try to pick a family that might need encouragement to get into the Christmas spirit. Then twelve days before Christmas, she and her family would begin slipping anonymous gifts onto the front porch of that family. They would write cute poems to go with the gifts, such as, “Twelve days before Christmas, a true friend gave to me, twelve candy canes, to hang upon the tree.” The eleventh day before Christmas might be eleven fancy bows, the tenth day, a tin of ten giant homemade cookies, on and on right up to Christmas Day.
One year the Moss family chose an elderly man who had suffered a stroke. He and his wife had decided not to put up a tree that year until the “twelve days” gifts started arriving. Another year they selected two families to cheer because both sons had friends whose families needed their love and care.
Patricia said that even after her sons were grown and had moved away, they still participated in this tradition when they returned home for Christmas.51
Patricia taught her children well, allowing them a hands-on opportunity not only to see good, but also to do good, moving them beyond their own problems as they gave generously of themselves to others.