He continued, “Go home and prepare a feast, holiday food and drink; and share it with those who don’t have anything: This day is holy to God. Don’t feel bad. The joy of God is your strength!” [Nehemiah 8:10 (NLT)]
An old abbot was fond of saying, “The devil is always the most active on the highest feast days.” The supreme trick of Old Scratch is to have us so busy decorating, preparing food, practicing music and cleaning in preparation for the feast of Christmas that we actually miss the coming of Christ. Hurt feelings, anger, impatience, injured egos—the list of clouds that busyness creates to blind us to the birth can be long, but it is familiar to us all. [Edward Hays]
With just one week until Christmas, we may find ourselves sorely tempted to repeat Scrooge’s “Bah, humbug!” We’ve been busy with planning, cooking, baking, cleaning, decorating, shopping, wrapping, packing, and shipping; chances are that our expectations have become unrealistic and impossible to achieve. It’s easy to get so wrapped up in doing and getting that we forget the purpose of this wonderful holiday.
The word “holiday,” however, doesn’t come from “holler-day” as in holler at your family because you’re over-booked or over-drawn, nor does it come from “hollow-day” as in feeling drained and exhausted. A holiday is not supposed to be a “horrible-day” either! The word “holiday” comes from the Old English hāligdæg from hālig, meaning holy, and dæg, meaning day and originally referred only to special religious or holy days. But, because Christians didn’t normally work on holy days, hāligdæg/holiday became associated with time off from work and took on the new meaning of “a day when commoners were exempt from labor.” Nowadays, along with its original meaning, we think of a holiday as time off from work, a vacation, or a simply a day of rest and relaxation.
As we prepare for the upcoming holiday, we want to remember to keep the day “holy,” which means keeping Christ in our Christmas festivities. But what about that other meaning of the word holiday— a day of festivity or recreation when no work is done! As we busy ourselves preparing for the holy day, could it be time to take a brief holiday…to pause and do some refreshing and recreating while we reorder our priorities? Let us take time in the midst of our busy preparations to ponder the meaning of that baby’s arrival in Bethlehem so long ago.
What if we took a break from all the season’s busyness and truly listened to the beautiful music of the Christmas season? We could reflect on the joy that came into the world, think about those “tidings of comfort and joy,” and let them fill our hearts. Singing along with the carols, we could “pa rum pum pum pum” with the little drummer boy, sing long glorias with the angels, and let the hallelujahs and fa-la-la-la-las echo throughout the house. God doesn’t care if we can’t carry a tune; our praise will be music to His ears!
Chances are, hours have been spent hanging lights or decorating the house; have you paused to enjoy the decorations or think about what they represent? Notice the star on the top of your tree and imagine the magnificence of the star of Bethlehem. Take the time to look at your nativity scene and think about the people depicted in it.
Why not pause long enough to put your feet up and read some Christmas stories or poems? The first Christmas story is found in Luke but there are other mood lifters like The Gift of the Magi, The Littlest Angel, The Christmas Candle, and even Dr. Seuss’ wonderful tale about the Grinch! Take a break and watch a holiday movie, drink a cup of cocoa with marshmallows, sit quietly by the fire, or make a list of things for which you’re thankful instead of things you need to do.
Let us heed Nehemiah’s words in today’s verse and allow the joy of the Lord to be our strength as we pause to remember the purpose of all this holiday hubbub—the celebration of Christ’s birth. Both Isaiah and John told us to clear the way for the Lord. As we clear the way for our holiday guests, have we cleared the way for Christ’s presence in our hearts? May we never forget the reason for the season!
Father, as we busy ourselves with preparations to celebrate Christmas, keep our hearts and minds focused on the real meaning of this holiday—the loving gifts of salvation, forgiveness, and restoration brought to us by the Christ child.
And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled ’till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more. [Dr. Seuss]
I began my prayer with the words of John Baille found in A Diary of Private Prayer. He opened the prayer by praising the “Lord and Maker of all things” for things like “the life that stirs within me” and “the bright and beautiful world around me.” But it was the inclusion of “all you have given me to fill my hours of leisure…music and books and good company and all the harmless and delightful pleasures” that gave me pause. How often do we offer praise and thanksgiving for “leisure” and the “delightful pleasures” of life? Do we regularly praise and thank Him for the taste of strawberries, the scent of lilacs, the joy of making love, napping in a hammock on a summer day, enjoying a latte and a fresh-baked almond croissant, completing a sudoku or crossword puzzle, a good workout at the gym, a game of mahjong or golf with friends, snuggling on the sofa with the cat, eating s’mores around a campfire, playing Crazy 8’s or Uno with the kids, binge watching Netflix on a rainy day, or warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream? Each of us has our favorite leisure activities and sources of pleasure and yet pleasure is not one of the words typically associated with Christian belief. In fact, many consider pleasures to be the devil’s tool used to keep us from a godly life!
Today’s socks tell me, “I am perfectly made” and remind me of Psalm 139’s affirmation that, “I have been remarkably and wondrously made.” All of my low-cut athletic socks have pithy affirmations woven into the toes. Depending on what pair I choose, I’m reminded that I have hope or that I’m loved, brave, strong, grateful, kind, powerful, blessed, or thankful. My favorite pair, however, tell me, “I am with you always!” It may seem silly, but there are times, especially during difficult days, when I recall the day’s affirmation on my feet and I stand a little more assuredly.
Found in almost every Roman Catholic church (and some Protestant and Orthodox ones), are the Stations of the Cross—a series of fourteen icons or carvings on the walls—each of which depict a moment in the Passion of Christ. Created to help people contemplate the events leading up to Christ’s crucifixion, they start with His death sentence from Pilate and end with His dead and battered body being laid in the tomb. Because Good Friday and Jesus’ death aren’t the end of the story, some churches have begun adding the resurrected Christ as a 15th station.
“Alleluia” (or “Hallelujah”), like “Amen,” is a word familiar throughout Christendom. Meaning “Praise the Lord,” it is the transliteration of the Hebrew hallel, meaning to shine, be boastful, praise, or rejoice and Yah, an abbreviated form of the name of the Lord: YHWH (Yahweh/Jehovah). Although two distinct words, they were consistently written as one (halleluyah). In the Old Testament, this extraordinary word occurs only in Psalms. Usually found at the beginning, halleluyah was an imperative call to praise or boast in the Lord—a call to shine a light upon Him! Whether we spell this beautiful word the Latin way as “alleluia” or the Greek way as “hallelujah,” the meaning is the same. Many modern translations simply translate it as “Praise the Lord!”
What would you do if you were six and your father said that your mom is in the hospital because she finds it hard to be happy and “did something stupid”? That question is answered in Duncan Macmillan and Jonny Donahoe’s one-act play, Every Brilliant Thing. In their play, that boy, now a grown man, tells the audience that he made of list of everything that was “brilliant” about the world—everything worth living for—and left it on his mother’s pillow. Reflecting a six-year old’s priorities, the list included ice cream, Kung-Fu movies, laughing so hard you shoot milk out your nose, burning things, construction cranes, and “me.” Although she returns the list with its spelling corrected, the boy’s mother never comments on it. Nevertheless, he keeps adding to his list. Although his mother eventually takes her life, the narrator tells how his list took on a life of its own and eventually saved him from his own depression and suicidal thoughts.
Devotions of the Heart 