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Merry Christmas!
December 24, 2003

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Starting on this upcoming new year, I'm going to start doing the Main Page again...my goal is three updates each week. It's going to be a big change...and it might be extra tough when there won't be any stripers around to write about, but it's something I've been needing to do for a long, long time now. I apologize for the months between updates, people got tired of hearing me write about how bad the striper fishing in NJ was becoming - and writing about it was really wearing on me, too. I've been fishing locally in the surf targeting striped bass now for 20 seasons - it breaks my heart when I sit down to write about one of the things I most love and then to face the realization of what it has become. But there's so much more going on with the website and fishing than just my local striper fishing experiences - and I miss sharing all of that stuff with everyone here :-) This site just completed it's fourth year in existence this past November - there are so many people here that have become much more than just friends. There's much to share, much to talk about, many good causes that we can help publicize, many fisheries battle we should be fighting, and the list goes on and on and on :-) So I'll be making a promise on New Year's to do at least 3 main page updates each week - and I'll do my best to keep the whining about how NJ's striper fishing has been tanking to a bare minimum ;-)

 

With that said, I'd like to wish each and everyone of you a most Merry Christmas, a healthy, happy and prosperous New Year, and a winter's worth of happy striper thoughts! Our friend Plug has put together what he called a "Christmas Card" for the main page - so I'm now going to leave you with Plug's Christmas Card. Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah and season's greetings...see yah next year!

 

Tim Surgent

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Plug's "Christmas Card"
"Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men"

That was the proclamation given by angels so many years ago, on the eve of Christ's birth. Today we find our nation at war. Perhaps some of us have friends and loved ones whose lives are imperiled on the streets of Baghdad or hillsides of Afghanistan. All of us will experience the bustle of this holiday season with its much coming and going under the "high alert" status of a terrorist threat. Where is the peace proclaimed by the angels two thousand years ago? Is the promise unfulfilled?

Jesus said, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid."

The peace that Jesus offers is not the absence of external conflict, but the reality of a right standing with God Almighty. It is the inward peace that comes from knowing that because of Jesus, our sins are forgiven and we have a relationship with God Almighty as our Heavenly Father. As the Bible says, "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Chris Rice said it so well in one of my favorite Christmas songs, "Welcome to Our World":

Tears are falling, hearts are breaking
How we need to hear from God
You've been promised, we've been waiting
Welcome Holy Child
Welcome Holy Child

Hope that you don't mind our manger
How I wish we would have known
But long-awaited Holy Stranger
Make Yourself at home
Please make Yourself at home

Bring Your peace into our violence
Bid our hungry souls be filled
Word now breaking Heaven's silence
Welcome to our world
Welcome to our world

Fragile finger sent to heal us
Tender brow prepared for thorn
Tiny heart whose blood will save us
Unto us is born
Unto us is born

So wrap our injured flesh around You
Breathe our air and walk our sod
Rob our sin and make us holy
Perfect Son of God
Perfect Son of God
Welcome to our world

May the peace of God be yours this Christmas season,

Plug

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