Let Christmas Be Christmas

It's Christmas Clatter's 100th episode!!! A special holiday message from Paul Burdine who has been friends with Todd for over 30 years and Todd reflects on the journey of Christmas Clatter and its future.

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Transcript

Duane: 0:15

Hi everyone. This is Dwayne, formerly of the Tinsel Tunes Podcast and now of In Lights, and I'm your average. Todd, I'd just like to wish you a very happy birthday for your hundredth episode. That's such a mammoth task getting there, and you have really taken the podcasting world by storm, and I really love listening to what you put out and also love watching you on YouTube and what you've done on there as well. So all the best for the future buddy. And as you say, keep Christmas alive every day. Hey Todd and everyone in the Christmas Clutter family. This is Art from a Cozy Christmas podcast and also from the Bookshelf Odyssey podcast. And I just wanted to get on to congratulate Todd on creating 100 wonderful episodes of Christmas Co Clutter.

Art: 1:05

I was a fan from the very first episode. And Todd, you really have encouraged. To start podcasting. In fact, your podcast was pretty much the final nail in my coffin as it were. That helped me make that final step of something I've always wanted to do to actually doing it. You were just a guy who loved Christmas and wanted to talk about it, and you put together such a wonderful podcast that it encouraged me to say. I can do this too, and in fact I wanna do this. And so thank you for that. Then finally, getting a chance to meet you in person, uh, last year. That was, that was really wonderful. I hope to do it again here soon. But what I like about your podcast is just your kindness and positivity. I'm so thankful that your voice is one of, of many that are promoting the message of Christmas. Uh, of being, kind of doing good, of celebrating the things you love and above all, keeping that Christmas hope alive every day. So thank you Todd, for 100 wonderful episodes. I am looking forward to 10 times that many in the days to come, and I can't wait to see what you're doing next on your channel. Uh, it's, it's been fun watching. Uh, your path. Well, you take care, and all of you at Christmas, clater have a very merry Christmas. Hello, this is Scott from the Christmas morning in Tinsel Tunes podcasts. I want to congratulate Christmas Clater on its 100th episode. Todd, this is a huge accomplishment. You have given so much and asked for very little in. So I'm honored to be here to say thank you on behalf of the countless thousands of lives you have touched through your love of Christmas. The hundreds of hours of content Todd has created represents thousands of hours of research planning, writing, recording, editing, and promoting. It's obviously a labor of love and we are all better off for it. So congratulations, Todd, and I'm looking forward to listening to your next 100 episodes. Cheers and Merry C.

Ken: 3:26

This is Ken Smith with North Pole News Dispatch. And Todd, I just want to take the time to congratulate you on your 100th episode of Christmas cla. Over the years, you and Christmas clutter has brought much joy and happiness to many folks, and I want to thank you for that. Once again, congratulations on your 100th episode of Christmas Cloud. And I hope you and your family have a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Chris: 3:58

Hi, I'm Chris from the Christmas time in the City podcast. I wanna congratulate Todd on making it to his 100th episode. Christmas Cloud was one of the podcasts that inspired my wife and I start our podcast way back when. Congratulations, Todd. I'm excited to see what you have in store for Christmas Cloud in the future. Here's to a hundred more episodes.

Brian: 4:18

Hey Todd, it's Brian Earl from Christmas Past. Congratulations on 100 episodes. That's a big accomplishment, and it seems like just yesterday that you and I were corresponding and you were letting me know about this idea you had in the back of your mind about starting a Christmas podcast. And over the years it's been wonderful to see the show grow, to see you, find your voice, and to see. Really take your place in the Christmas podcasting community. The work that you do is really important. You spread a lot of Christmas cheer to a lot of people. You bring a lot of comfort and joy all throughout the year, but especially at this most festive time of the year. And I'm really grateful for our friendship and our creative collaborations that we've had over the years. You've been very generous about coming on my show many times, leading trivia games, and you're always around when I want to bounce an idea off you or just chat and say hi. So take a moment to sit back and reflect on this great accomplishment of 100 episodes, and I hope to be able to send another one of these little congratulations messages to you when you reach episode 200. Merry Christmas to you and the family, and to all of your listeners. Thanks very much.

Todd: 5:49

Well, hello everybody in Merry Christmas. First of all, I want to thank those that, uh, sent those kind messages in to help me celebrate my 100th episode of this podcast, Christmas Clater. Thank you guys. So Mary, well, hello everybody in Merry Christmas. Thanks so much. Scott, Chris, Ken, Brian, Dwayne, and Art, uh, for sending in those messages to help me celebrate 100 episodes here at Christmas. Clater, I cannot believe it's 100 episodes. Uh, should have happened a while back, but, uh, it took six months off this year. Uh, much needed, but I keep bringing that up and I keep saying to myself every time I hear myself say, I need to quit bringing that up at it's old news. But here we are. This is our special Christmas Eve episode. I know it's the 23rd on the day of this release, but that's just kind of how we do things around here at Christmas. Clater, uh, I wanna encourage each and everyone, if you didn't get to hear the episode yesterday, please do, uh, where I encourage you to meet us under the stars this Christmas Eve at midnight as we welcome in. Christmas day and let, uh, Christmas be Christmas. But I won't keep you guys, uh, very long. Uh, today. I know everybody's busy doing things and I don't want to take up any more time than, uh, I have to. Uh, but a few things before we get to our special Christmas message. I started Christmas Cloud in May. 2019 then it was a variety shows. It's changed quite a bit. I used to do Christmas memories a lot. I don't do those very much at all. Mainly cuz I was kind of running out, doing, you know, one a month. It's like, I'm, I'm 45 right now. I only had so many memories. You know, not every Christmas has a spectacular memory I can, you know, draw upon. So I kinda had stopped those. You used to do, uh, the most wonderful talent of the month. I haven't even had a theme song made and, uh, I should have dug it out for this episode. Maybe another anniversary episode. I had, uh, listeners submit talent and I kind of quit doing that because once Christmas was over, most people weren't thinking about Christmas. Things like, you know, making music and that stuff. But met a lot of great, wonderful people along the way that I never thought I would be able to and spurred some friendships that with people I never thought I would be able to. And people that you know. I didn't, wouldn't know even existed in the world other than through this podcast and through YouTube. It is absolutely amazing the journey that this podcast has taken me on. Um, there's times I love it to pieces and to be honest, there's times I'm not really caring for it because it can be and is a lot of hard work. We pushed through and, and, uh, but that's just kind of the human emotion of it all. I started this podcast because there was just something I felt was missing in the Christmas podcasting world. Wasn't sure quite what it was. Figured. Maybe if I, if I, uh, hunted and pecked long enough, I would find it. I think I, I think I kind of found my, my spot as a you. Brother Christmas as it is, you know, just the, the place to come and get your dose of Christmas and a little bit of hope where everybody's welcome and that wouldn't be possible if it wasn't for you listening. I have, uh, some more to say, but. Before I get to that, I want to present to you uh, our Christmas message. It's from a very dear friend of mine, one of my best friends in the whole world. We've been best friends since the sixth grade, and that in and of itself is a miracle, though is my great honor to introduce you guys to my friend Pastor Paul Bird.

Paul: 10:25

Hello, Christmas Clater Podcast. Greetings to you all from the City of Champions. Sweet Home, Alabama. I reside right here in Tuscaloosa. Hey, my name is Paul Burdine and I have been friends with the host of this show for an amazing 34 years now. He is very, very, very dear to me. He's. Probably the best friend that God ever gave me. You know, we were even best men at each other's weddings. We had senior pictures made together, and as a 45 year old man, I still call his mother Connie, my other mom. At one point in my life, I probably stayed at Todd's house more than my own home. Todd. Has always had an inordinate love for Christmas for as long as I can remember. He's always loved that dreaded Black Friday shopping, chaos. You know, so many of us have tried structuring our schedules to avoid that madness. But not Todd? No. Todd actually runs into the madness. Headlong, yeah., or at least he used to when we used to live close to one another. We haven't been around one another where we lived close in proximity in over 10 years. But it's amazing how good friendships, whenever you're parted by geography, even when you get back around one another, it's like you never missed anything. And we pick up where we left off last. You know, once upon a time in a land far, far away, before Todd and I had kids, or before we had wives, or we had responsibilities or bills or our own families, we were just a couple of average video game junkie kids who collected comic books and we listened to all kinds of music from the temptations to hard rock hair metal. Um, we didn't know what our futures would look like, but we were sure that they were destined for greatness. I don't remember what Todd's exact dream was. I was quite sure though, that at any day I would receive a call and, uh, be told, Hey, we need you to be the next guitarist for Motley Crew because, uh, you know, our old guitarist is getting older or some other. Hard rock group from the eighties or nineties. But at any rate, we were just a couple of friends. We were boys who were incredible friends, I should say. We rode our bikes everywhere around the little, uh, town that we lived in. We played lots, and I would like to underscore lots. And draw attention to lots. We did play lots, and I do mean a lot of basketball. Never in a million years did I ever think that I would become a pastor someday, but here we are. The journey of life is truly full of surprises. And it was my honor this year to have my very best friend call me and ask me if I would consider reading the Christmas story to his most cherished audience. Um, Christmas was so much fun around the Killion home. Todd's mother to this day continues the tradition that she started when a few hungry teenage boys hung out in her kitchen while she was baking cookies. It was almost like a chicken challenge, you know, Hey Connie, I bet you can't bake enough cookies. That Todd, his sister, their friends, and the entire church family could come and all eat and still have cookies left over. But you know what Connie did year after year? She proved us to be a bunch of unworthy competitors, and her magnificent kitchen stood victorious over a couple of boys who whimpered in the corner, suffering some from severe stomach aches by the end. And, uh, now this annual event is known far and wide in southeast Missouri, known as Cookie Day. Todd's family had so much fun during the Christmas season. Christmas was always magical at their house every year. I was nearly as excited as Todd was to see what would happen. And that brings me to my thoughts that I've been contemplating since Todd reached out to me. You know, it's very common in. Time here around Christmas to hear people talk about advent. One of the aspects of Advent is the notion of hope, the idea of hope. Now the, I, the, the sense of hope that is described in advent is a much different type of hope than that type of hope that Todd and myself used to exhibit when we were teenagers. Because when we were teenagers, you know, we quote unquote hoped for frivolous things, things like. Well, one of the things that I remember is Todd's father was the chief engineer at the local TV station. He had connections. Um, and Todd and I would lay in the floor, uh, with their dog paddles or their dog Baxter, and we would watch the news broadcast when it would begin to snow, and we would hope that it would snow so much that school would get canceled for the next day. Or my dad. Was the pastor and, uh, that he was the pastor of the church that, that, uh, Todd's family went to. And Todd and I would hope that the preacher would stop preaching early so we could get out and go to Dairy Queen or Burger King or the Waffle House and visit with our friends or maybe something else that we experienced. We hoped that our parents didn't find out what we just did. So many people can identify with that, or maybe it was a hope that the teacher won't give us any homework tomorrow. You get the idea of what I'm talking about. We call those types of things hope, but really what we are expressing is just optimism, and we may as well be wishing to the stars or throwing a penny into the wishing well. When we look at Advent though, and we talk about. that hope is a completely different kind of hope. The hope that is based around Advent is based on, I know it's going to happen, I just don't know when. And there were if, if you go back into the Old Testament, I know not everybody's a Bible nerd like myself, but if you go back into the Old Testament prophecies, They describe this hope that is coming in the Christ child and there were two words that they used to use that were synonymous for hope in the old Hebrew text. And one of those words was the word and it simply means to wait for the other word that is often. In conjunction with hope to define hope is the word.. This word is more of a word picture that conveys the idea of whenever you take something like a a string, uh, they didn't have rubber bands, but you can, you can get the idea of watching someone stretch a rubber band to the point. Where it's almost about to break. It's been stretched so far that you know it's going to snap, but you just don't know when it's going to happen. And both of these words are used over and over in those Old Testament writings, and when they're used together, they give the idea of waiting or expectation. And like I said, whenever Todd reached out to me, Reading the Christmas story this year. I thought about hope. I thought about the idea of waiting because that's exactly what happened. These prophecies about this Christ child, the hope of the world, were given some 700 years prior to the story that I'm about to read to you. You know what happened? That's exactly what happened. They waited, the whole world waited year after year, waiting decade after decade waiting. More waiting century after century waiting. And finally, after 700 ish years of waiting, we have this story that I'm going to read to you. The story goes like this. At that time, the Roman Emperor Augustus decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. This was the first census taken. COR was Governor of SE of Syria, all returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea. David's ancient home. He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Gale. He took with him Mary, to whom he was engaged, who was now expecting a child, and while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. She gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger because there was no lodging available for them that night. There were shepherds staying in fields nearby, guarding their flocks of. Suddenly the angel of the Lord appeared among them and the radiance of the Lord's glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them. Don't be afraid. He said, I bring you good news. That will bring great joy to all people. The Savior? Yes, the Messiah. The Lord has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David, and you will recognize him by this sign. You will find a baby wrapped in snugly or wrapped snugly in strips of cloth lying in a man. Suddenly the angel was joined by a vast host of others, the armies of heaven, praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest heaven and peace on earth, to those with whom God is pleased. When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, let's go to Bethlehem. Let's see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about. They hurried to the village and found Marion Joseph, and there was the baby lying in the manger. After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child. All who heard the shepherds story were astonished, but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them. Often, the shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them. As you experience Christmas this year, I would like to remind you that you are partaking in that same hope of the world. You know, if you were to read a little bit further than what I did in that same chapter of Luke chapter two, you'd encounter a story. Of when Jesus was taken to the temple for his purification offering that was required by the law of Moses. There you would find an individual by the name of Simeon. Simeon was an old man and he was waiting. He was waiting on two things. He was waiting to die. But he was also waiting on the promise of this child. He was waiting to die, but he wasn't willing to die until he was able to lay eyes on the one that he had been waiting for, and that was Jesus. And there's an interesting story here about whenever Simeon finally saw Jesus, he took the child. And after seeing Jesus, he makes a blessing, a pronouncement of blessing upon Jesus in the earshot of Joseph and Mary. And one of the things that he says about Jesus is that he will be a light to reveal God to the nations friends. I want you to know that he is still a shining light in the darkness. Of humanity. I would like to take this time to wish you this very wonderful audience of the Christmas Clatter podcast and my amazing friend Todd, a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Thank you so much for joining me as I read through Luke chapter two, and I hope you were blessed and you have a great time with your families over these holidays. Thank you so much.

Todd: 25:04

Ah. Thank you, Paul, for that special Christmas message for us. I really appreciate it, man. I appreciate your friendship all these years. Well guys, I'm gonna let you go for this holiday season. We've completed our journey to Christmas 2022. I hope everyone has a healthy and safe, Merry Christmas and a happy new. I'll be taking a break again, but it won't be nearly as long as it was. Uh, this year I'll be back for a special episode in January, and then soon after that we'll begin our Christmas journey again for Christmas 2023. I have a lot of plans for 2023 for Christmas Cloud. Other things. So I'll just live you with this as a teaser slash it for Christmas 2023. Let you and me create something together. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year, and until we meet again, keep Christmas Hope alive. Every day.