Shortly before Christmas one year, when my kids were about four, six, and eight, anonymous presents began turning up on our doorstep during the night. We'd go out to fetch the newspaper, and there they'd be--Christmas mugs, a wicker sleigh filled with peppermints, cookie cutters in Christmas shapes, even a Christmas clock. A note explained that the gifts were in honor of the twelve days of Christmas.

You can imagine how thrilled our kids were. They left notes and pictures out for the "elves," as we took to calling them, baked cookies for them, and warned each other sternly every night to NOT go outside before everyone was awake.

At the end of the twelve days the elves revealed themselves and invited us over for dinner. It was a family we knew from church. We didn't know them well; they'd just chosen a family they thought would enjoy the game, which we very much did. And every night they'd driven across town, parked in the the dark around the corner, and sent the son of the family, then in his early teens, to creep up to our porch and deliver the next day's gift.

That family is desperately in need of prayers today. The son--his name is Jerrod--is having surgery for a large brain tumor. (That's his dad with him in the picture above.)

A family friend has set up a website for the family here.