Hi, and welcome to the Five Word Prayers Daily, a five day a week daily devotional where we share the

word, prayers, and our heart. I'm Lisa Whittle, and I welcome you to just five minutes with me,

which I trust and pray will be five minutes well spent. Well, we've got a good one today, and it's my

friend, Alex Kirkendahl, author, speaker, wife, and mom of four girls, love that, and podcaster with my girl Krista Gilbert of the

Open Door Sisterhood, which is one of my favorite podcasts to be a guest on. Alex is wise and real,

and she knows some things about Christmas since she wrote a fantastic book called Loving My

Actual Christmas. It's really about being present for this season.

And I know that Christmas is almost here,

but it's not too late to dive into this book

or get a really good head start on next year

and have it ready to read for then.

I'm ready to hear some great wisdom from Alex.

So share with us, my friend.

We are on the home stretch of Christmas, aren't we?

The last few days where we Christmas orchestrators, you know, the people who make Christmas

happen for everyone around them, start to hit panic mode.

We start to think about all of the things that we have not done yet, that we want to get done, and all of the gifts that we want to buy that we have

not bought. As we consider gift giving and giving in general during the last few days of Christmas

crazy making, let us center ourselves

a little bit and not operate out of panic, but out of peace. Because I know when I operate out of panic,

I don't make the best decisions. And if my credit card is in my hand as I'm in that panic

mode, I feel it later in January.

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