Sharing coffee can open door to Christmas miracles

Christmas and cold weather go together like adults and their routines; they both can leave you feeling frigid and detached from the real meaning of the season.

Fear not if you have been wearied by the trappings of an overly adult population suffering from years of burnout and insensitivity, because of the barrage of media marketing and all their empty emotional promises about a purchase that’s going to make this Christ­mas more special.

There is a cure for this common ailment. Like a cup of coffee, church history can warm the heart and soul of the most cynical skeptic and rigid adults.

Take, for instance, this idea of Santa Claus. We tell children all about this make-believe elf who magically delivers gifts down the chimney on a worldwide scale. Then we wonder why they grow up to be angry adult elves themselves who are disillusioned with Christmas.

When our oldest son was in elementary school, a teacher told him Santa wasn’t real and wasn’t based on a real person. The child came home almost in tears. We recently had been having some meaningful discussions about the real Santa Claus because he’d been asking me a lot of Santa questions.

I had told him the truth about the real Santa. St. Nicho­las was the real deal. Born in 280 A.D. in what is part of present-day Turkey, both his parents died when he was very young. He used his inheritance to help the poor and sick. He became Bishop of Myra, a city now known as Demre. He became known as the protector of children and sailors and for gift giving.

St. Nicholas attempted to give gifts in secret. He mainly was known for his generosity to people who needed it.

He loved children and sailors and was rich, but gave all his family’s wealth away and spent time in prison for his beliefs. Not exactly your modern day, TV-type preacher or televangelist. He obviously wasn’t afraid to take the low road being known for helping humble people and little children.

History has this way of putting things into proper prospective and enlightening the soul of cynical adults and teachers, who are willing to accept it. Anyone who cares about children and sailors and secretly gives away a fortune to help others is a friend in my book.

Maybe we need to go back to referring to Santa Claus as St. Nick?

So you’re still cynical. Well, St. Nick was known as a patron saint of sailors and he must have prayed for and shown acts of kindness to many sailors to gain such a reputation.

What if this Christmas, as cold as it may be inside and out in your life, you make a conscious decision to be like Nick? Find any service member or veteran and take them out for a cup of coffee.

At Joshua’s Friends and Your Best Life Now Counsel­ing, we call this the Veteran Coffee Kudos Chal­lenge and we believe everyone who takes a veteran out for coffee this Christmas is going to set miracles in motion.

Yes, I believe a cup of coffee can be full of Christmas miracles and, by serving it in the attitude of St. Nick, we can become part of something that’s much bigger than ourselves.

Suddenly, we begin seeing Christmas miracles happen in the lives of people who have served and protected us well. Find a veteran and take them out for coffee this Christmas. Don’t take no for an answer. Show them this article and if you have to, call me, and I personally will convince them to have coffee with you.

By the way, be ready. Because that cold Christmas feeling and angry elf living in your heart will be transformed into a St. Nick-like disposition.

Everything about Christmas changes and stops feeling so cold on the inside and the outside when we discover encounters that uncover the real meaning of Christmas. It’s impossible to purposefully show acts of kindness to those in our society who may feel forgotten or disenfranchised.

So be ready as you break your routine. This is a purchase that really is going to make this year’s Christmas more special.

Welcome back, Christmas.