Christmas--When We Need to Work Fast and Breathe Slow

"I think we need to just stop!" the song leader had declared Sunday morning as he began the Christmas program with a Christmas carol or two.

"There's so much rush and pell mell and shopping and trying to get it all done--

and we need to just stop and slow down."

Guilty.

Our morning had started out with rushing about as usual to load people, food, clothes, props for the program, gifts for extended family, Christmas cards for church family, and various other paraphernalia into the van.

There we went down the road, cards and bows and elf hats all over the dash.

Children safely strapped in and grinning like silly monkeys.

Mom on the front seat, her lap piled with stuff that wouldn't fit elsewhere--somehow having managed to laugh about it!

We had hurried through the one hour practice for the program, the children saying their pieces or playing their songs on bells or piano,

and getting all the little children of the church outfitted with costumes for the manger scene.

The children and I had made these sheep out of poster board and batting.

And so there we were, beginning the service, children antsy about their pieces, parents probably antsier, and we are reminded about slowing down.
He said he had thought about singing "Alleluia," really slow.

Maybe we should have.
We did need to slow down--perhaps.
Because Christmas is all about Jesus.
Yes, it is. 

But it is also about being His hand extended, and His heart beating.
It's about being a vessel He can use.
It's about the whole Christmas spirit--the coming together of a bunch of poor, flawed humans

who sometimes get bothered with each other,

and just coming together and cooperating enough to play a couple Christmas songs on the hand bells, directed by a lady who has found a new home in our church--
and who had an old set of bells that she wanted to be used.

It is also about reaching out to the parents and siblings of new or old children who have been coming to church.

Giving new people a reason to come--

and take pictures.

It's a reason to include children from broken homes,

children who wake up crying at night, afraid they will not be allowed to stay with a foster mom at our church.

One wakes up at night throwing up from stress.

It's about including other precious children who have just been rescued from a horrible, debasing situation,

and teaching them and helping them to sing "Away in a Manger."

It's about teaching little children to get up, speak up, and then shut up.

It's about the beautiful message of the hymn, "Silent Night," played from the arrangement the bell choir director asked Carrie and Rose to do, accompanied by Sis. Gault.

It's about another nervous young girl singing so well, "C is for the Christ child, born upon the hay."

accompanied by her father on the guitar--playing so nicely and gently.

And our own boy saying a piece he'd practiced so hard to learn.

It's about church moms and new moms at church and grandmothers and children all leaving the sanctuary toward the end of the service to get ready for the manger scene and song.
It's about them all working together to make sure every little child, even the ones who arrived only one week before, can wear some kind of costume and be included in the manger scene---

because each child is valuable, and Christ came for all, and there is room at the cross for you!

And yes, the wise men were wearing everything from dress shoes to sneakers to snow boots, 

and you'd never know which ones were my kid's, would you?

And it was about the moms and grandmoms standing there keeping the children quiet as they waited in the foyer for the pastor to tell all about what Christ did,

and no, it didn't seem very spiritual standing back there taking pictures of antsy little children in their costumes and then getting down to their tiny level and showing them their own pictures on the tiny camera screen

to cheer them and keep them quiet, especially the ones who wake up crying or throwing up at night from the distress they live with.

 Yes, we needed to be reminded to slow down, and to just stop.

And we did.

But then we kept right on going through the program and the greeting of each other afterward, and the cleaning up and dismantling of the "stable," and putting things to rights for the evening service.

Because Christmas is about church family--and reaching out to that person you've had a problem with, or who has had a problem with you, and going ahead and shaking that hand and saying, "Merry Christmas" with a smile from your face and goodwill from your heart--and funny how you can forget about that miff.

And Christmas is about extended family, too, and getting together for Christmas Sunday dinner,

including the greenery and tinsel and bright colors and twinkling lights and Christmas cans of popcorn from Walmart or Kmart lined up against the wall, dressed up with big, fancy bows.

 It's about setting beautiful tables like Grandma does,

and setting on little round goblets of colorful fruit salad.

But it's also about greeting that person maybe you've had a tiff or a miff with,
or who's had a tiff or a miff with you.

Just going ahead and looking them in the eye and saying, "Merry Christmas!"

and finding something kind and cheerful to say..

It's about acting with dignity and strength instead of with craven fear.
 Because if we are busy hanging onto the branches of our little miff tree, hanging desperately onto old grudges, fearful of the foolish gossip going around,

or wallowing about in cynicism, sure that a liar lies in wait behind every bush and a hypocrite lurks behind every pew at church,

then yes, we really do need to STOP and sing more than a few Christmas carols.

 Because Christmas is about letting go of the old and welcoming the new.
 It's also about welcoming a newcomer into the family--Irina from Russia,

Jonathan's uncle's fiance.

It was a pleasure getting to meet her and get acquainted--and to invite them both to our church's candlelight service that evening--and then to have them be willing to come!

It made our Christmas--even as they said this wonderful day made theirs, too!

 Uncle George met people at our church that he hadn't seen in 57 years, he said, and he felt like it was a "home-coming."

And isn't Christmas about coming home?

I saw Irina look about at all the bright candles that night, and the bright faces, and isn't Christmas about lights and joy?

The girls played their bell duet again, this time accompanied by Crystal, who had only that day to practice for it, and who did so well. Piano lessons at college have kept her progressing.

We were so proud of her. 

We also did that little skit I already shared about in the other post, "Keeping Christmas."

And isn't Christmas about doing something, whatever it is, as a family, and being proud of one another and feeling blessed?

But isn't it also about reaching out to people who don't have loving and supportive families?

Isn't it about including in the candlelighting boys from a very difficult and broken home--

 who sometimes struggle to behave in school and keep from getting suspended?

A boy who doesn't have much to live for besides Ramen noodles and an X-box?

Letting him carry the candle down the aisle, lighting others' candles?

 Maybe we do have to rush about sometimes at Christmas

in order to do these kind of things. 

Maybe our lives do rush pellmell sometimes as we strive to bring a little joy and light to a darkened world, as we wear ourselves out reaching out to the homeless and cheerless and tear-streaked and sick at heart.

Maybe we have to spend quite a bit of time putting out fires and helping people come down their miff trees and lay down their grudges and forgive each other and say sorry,

and it isn't just little kids who need help doing those things. 

Maybe our lives aren't always serene and uninterrupted and waveless.

The lives of our brothers and sisters in persecuted lands aren't, either.

The lives of those fleeing from ISIS aren't, either.

And so, yes, it is good to stop and sing more than one Christmas carol.

But it is also good to remember we don't have much time left to do good--

and so we ought to do it with all our might. 

It's true we'll come home to stacks of dirty dishes,

 and a messy table,

 back home to stacks of dirty laundry and to coats and skit paraphernalia dumped all over the furniture.

but if our lives can't be a living Christmas carol,

is it really Christmas?

So can we work fast
and breathe slow this week?
And yes, stop somewhere along the line to sing more than one Christmas carol, too!

Keeping Christmas

This is the reading (from an old Ideals magazine) that Jonathan gave last night in our church's Christmas Sunday candlelight service, with the children adding a few props and acting out small parts as he read.

Bro. Lefever accompanied the reading on the organ, beginning with a Christmas carol, and ending with "Love Divine."

"Keeping Christmas"

by Henry van Dyke --(one of my favorite writers from olden days)

" It is a good thing to observe Christmas Day. The mere marking of times and seasons, when men agree to stop work and make merry together, is a wise and wholesome custom."

"It helps one to feel the supremacy of the common life over the individual life.

It reminds a man to set his own little watch, now and then, by the great clock of humanity which runs on sun time.
[This is one of the three tables set up at Grandma and pa Lucas's home for Christmas Sunday dinner we spent with Jonathan's clan.]

"But there is a better thing than the observance of Christmas Day,

and that is keeping Christmas.

 "Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people and to remember what other people have done for you; to ignore what the world owes you and to think what you owe the world;

 to put your rights in the background and your duties in the middle distance and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground;

 to see your fellow men are just as real as you are and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy;

to own that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life but what you are going to give to life; 

to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness-

 -are you willing to do these things for even a day? 

Then you can keep Christmas.

Are you willing to stoop down and consider the needs and desires of little children;

to remember the weakness and loneliness of people who are growing old;

to stop asking how much your friends love you, and ask yourself whether you love them enough;

to bear in mind the things that other people bear on their hearts;

 to try to understand what those who live in the same house with you really want, without waiting for them to tell you;

to trim your lamp so that it will give more light and less smoke;

 and to carry it in front so that your shadow will fall behind you;

to make a grave for your ugly thoughts and a garden for your kind feelings
with the gate open--are you willing to do these things even for a day?

Then you can keep Christmas.

Are you willing to believe that love is the strongest thing in the world---

 

stronger than hate, stronger than death--and that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem nineteen hundred years ago

 is the image and brightness of Eternal Love?

Then you can keep Christmas!

Costumes for Christmas: Real or Fake?

Carrie came up with these costumes for Danny and Hannah for the Christmas program coming up at our church.

"Dress rehearsal" was last Sunday, and

 the church ladies were frantically trying to figure out costumes so all the new young children, some from homes wrecked by drug use, could be included in the manger scene. 

Wise men, shepherds, Joseph and Mary, angels!

Working with the costumes and the whole idea of trying to personify someone else
besides yourself reminds me of a little thought someone posted on Facebook recently:

"There is one thing that I have observed over the years in relationships, not just personal relationships but business, pastoral, interpersonal, etc.  There is a quality that will trump almost every other quality such as skill, beauty, talent, even to some degree professionalism.....That quality is Realness. Being Authentic. Genuineness. Just observed it play out beautifully this morning and had to share... I'll take Real with flaws any day over Fake perfection!"

 

 And so the flawed but real people practice handbells for the program,

and flawed but real men practice brass.

And flawed but real people fellowship over a country meal of lasagna (with homegrown pork sausage and home made goat cheese) and cranberry muffins, with herb tea served in Ukrainian teapot and cups afterward.

 I think one of the signs of whether people are being real or not

is their ability to relate to children.

Which may include playing with them, like Wilmer Paulus did while he and the younger children were drying dishes.

 He got himself into quite the game snapping dish towels at the boys, with the boys snapping back generously.

 Maybe a bit too generously!

 The Pauluses shared about God's Missionary Church missions Sunday morning in church, and on their way to our church they had stopped at our place.

 We had such a good time with them, getting to feeling right at home very shortly!

 I felt I could sit at Sis. Linda's feet quite a while, for she was full of common sense opinions and advice.

Pauluses have six children, and she said they have to do a lot of adjusting as their children now all have families of their own.

 It was great to discuss how they have chosen to celebrate Christmas--choosing to take turns with in-laws and also allowing their children to celebrate with just their own families at home if they choose. At times, they are lonely, but they feel it is selfish to expect all their children to celebrate Christmas at the same place each year. 

In-laws and the growing families themselves need to be considered and taken turns with.

Each family has to decide for themselves what is best each year, esp. since some families are bigger than others.

Summer reunions every other year sometimes work well because there isn't so much sickness and busyness as there is at Christmas, she said.

And so instead of exchanging gifts at Christmas, they all pitch in for a bi-annual summer reunion somewhere special.

We appreciated the great ideas and I'm sharing them because there are many of us dealing with these issues as our families grow up and we have to make adjustments.

It was great to see the example of another older couple adjusting with grace and consideration for their grown children and their separate choices.

 

I know for a fact that grown children appreciate the kind of parent that is proactive about letting go, and releasing expectations, yet finding ways to keep a loving and close relationship.

The girls made lots of cookies last week before going Christmas caroling with church folk.

I had ended up in a lot of pain with my shoulder/back out again for a few days, so I ended up with an electric hot pad behind me, checking schoolwork in the afternoon, with school books, etc. piled on the piano bench beside me.

The girls made Molasses Crinkle cookies, Chocolate cookies with kisses on top, and some sort of sugar cookie with orange peel. Mmm.

Then they made plates of cookies to pass out where they caroled.

Rose made these cute "pigs in blankets" one day recently, with biscuit dough.

Christmas Hay for the Cows!

John Piper says, “God is always doing 10,000 things in our lives, and we may be aware of 3 of them.”

Something He did for us last week was deliver a bunch of free hay for us--right at the end of our road!

The children saw the flatbed truck that lost four huge round bales of hay stopped further down the road as the driver tightened the straps around the rest of his hay.

Then they watched a policeman come later and rake hay off the road.

Then we saw a truck come with a bobcat on a flatbed trailer and load two and a half of the bales that were still intact.

The one and a half bales' worth of hay that had come apart was left lying there by the road--right at the end of our circle!

So early the next morning after breakfast and before school, most of us headed out to retrieve what we could of that wonderful hay for our cows.

Rose and Sam managed the pitchforks,

and I pitched by the armload.

Timmy, Danny and Hannah tramped it down into the trailer beside the hay we ourselves had just bought.

It's always a special joy to be out in the early morning in the sunshine--and it seemed a special gift from God to have this hay delivered almost to our doorstep it seemed!

 Here is another quote from my favorite blog:

What if instead of worrying about the 10,000 things we have to do this Christmas season, we spent it looking for more of the 10,000 things God is already doing in our lives? --Matt Brown

 Too often we cram our days with too much to do--or we have expectations of others, ourselves, and the season that are set way too high.

We can't do everything we want to do, and we just have to accept that. 

We can't do everything that everyone else wants us to do, and we have to accept that, too.

Things are going to go wrong; there is going to be bad news; tragedies are going to happen around us;

kids are going to squabble; adults are going to stress out and do dumb things;

the dog or the cat  is going to get on your last nerve;

you might, in some unexpected moment, feel like you hate someone you actually love.

 This Christmas is just not going to be perfect--at least not by our definition.

But right in the middle of this season, we can pause and take time to remember

what God is doing in our lives--like delivering hay to our back door!