Kathy,
Praise the Lord! I am so happy your Christmas was so nice and Chris did the
right thing and treated all of you with respect.  I know you all had to work
on it but it is a good beginning.  You know the Lord had to soften his heart
for everything to work so smoothly.  You and Greg do deserve some of the
credit as well.  Jesus made the changes but you never gave up on Chris and
you stood your ground when you thought it necessary.  Praise his holy name.
Miracles still happen.
Merry Christmas to all of you and may God bless you richly.  You could not
have had a better Christmas present than having your whole family in church
together.
Virgie and Hoshi
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kathy Du Bois" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, December 25, 2005 2:43 PM
Subject: Christmas was a success


> Hi Everybody,
>        Well, its Christmas afternoon.  Chris has left.  All went
> well.  thank you for praying!!  My Christmas actually began on Friday
> evening.  A few of us from church did Christmas caroling at our local
> retirement, residential independent living facility. We sang and
> handed out little books with meditations on the reason for the
> season.  I think that everybody enjoyed it.  Some of those people
> don't get much in the way of visitors so, at least it was something.
>        Then, our family went caroling with another group for about another
> hour, but this time, we were walking through a neighborhood and
> singing outside.  We all carried homemade lanterns and sang our
> hearts out.  It was a real, old fashioned, New England event.  We had
> so much fun!
>        Greg picked Chris up after work on Saturday.  Chris was very
> pleasant.  We all worked at getting along.  He was polite and
> everything.     We thought that Matt was going to have to work last
> night and miss the Christmas eve service, but, as a Christmas present
> for me, he asked for two hours off and came to the service to
> surprise me.  I had my whole family in church last night and this
> morning.  I truly felt so blessed.
>        We've had our dinner now and Greg took Chris to his room to drop
> off
> his stuff and then took him to Nicky's.  I pray that this was a good
> first step toward reconciliation.  Chris told me that he wished that
> he had invited Nicky last night to the christmas eve service  after
> all.  We had encouraged him to do so, but, oh well.  Maybe next
> year!  He also told me, before he left, that he liked being in
> church.  He had been nervice about that, I know, but the people
> welcomed him well.  I'd like to believe that, in some way, he really meant
> it.
>        For our Christmas eve service we do the triditional lessons and
> carols of Christmas.  It's probably the one time of the year that we
> get a little high church like, but it is so moving.  We had a lot of
> visitors from the community last night and Greg gave a pretty strong
> invitation  at the end.  Who knows what seeds were planted.
>        Well, enough of my babbling.  Oops, sorry Brad!  I know, that's
> supposed to be your trade mark.  I'm just bubbling over with joy and
> relief, I guess and I wanted to share with my prayer warriors as soon
> as possible.  Thank you so much for adding to my successful
> Christmas.  Now I can relax and look forward to a few days of just
> taking it easy.  Thank you Lord!
> Merry Christmas everyone!
> Kathy