Gospel for Asia

My favorite Christmas gift I have received is a small whisk, a little bigger than a pencil. My children bought it for me three years ago. It is perfect for whipping up a glaze for scones, which I make quite often. It is also useful for whisking just one egg for an egg wash. I love kitchen items as gifts because they are very useful but something I rarely splurge on for myself. They are a practical luxury. Do I need a pencil-sized whisk? Of course not. Do I use it often? You bet! Giving thoughtful gifts is a genuine act of love. A gift that someone would use all the time but would not buy themselves is the best kind. Fulfilling a need shows care. Many items in Gospel for Asia Christmas Gift Catalog are practical luxuries: They are gifts that our partners on the field often make do without, but such gifts can be an everyday blessing. Bible-college students studying in the Himalayan mountains received winter clothing packets. Many of these women are from poor backgrounds and came to Bib...

Almost every year for the last 14 years, I have offered a 24-hour Advent retreat of silence during the first week of December. Advent, on the liturgical calendar, is the beginning of the church year that follows the life of Christ for 12 months. This retreat felt like a perfect way to begin centering the minds of Christ-followers and provide a decent antidote, if taken, to protect against the consumerism, the commercialism and the secularism of the world that surrounds us. It’s easy to be sucked into all that, if we’re not careful. For me, the Advent retreat is always a gift of love. I generally come home after it ends, physically blasted from hauling and designing and interacting. Nothing in my home speaks of Christmas, and often, by early December here in Chicago, some early snow and dropping temperatures mean that the barrel by the mailbox, which I always decorate, including some message for passersby, will be frozen. This fall, corn shocks and wild grasses, dried allium heads and...