Keeping Christmas

DELACERNA

There is a better thing than the observance of Christmas day, and that is keeping Christmas, according to Henry Van Dyke. In his short essay of the same title, he gives sets of questions for us to ponder as we prepare for the birth of the Christ Child.

First, we are asked, 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 that men and women are just as real as you are, and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy;

To own up to the fact 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 even for a day? Then you can keep Christmas.

Then we are asked, Are you willing:

To stoop down and consider the needs and desires of little children;

To remember the weakness and loneliness of people of people 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 have to bear in 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 kindly 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 evil, stronger than death —

And that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem to thousand years ago is the image and brightness of the Eternal Love?

Then you can keep Christmas. And if you can keep it for a day, why not always? But you can never keep it alone.

* * *

Through the years I have accumulated books which I bought or were given by friends which I have not completely read because of lack of time. Now that I am retired, it’s so comforting to browse over them and get some enlightenment. One of the books which I almost forgot is “Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World” or “Finding Intimacy with the Lord in the Busyness of Life” by Joanna Weaver. I always thought of myself as a Martha, not a Mary. But reading the book, it is possible to have a Mary heart in a Martha world. It just needs perseverance — keeping on keeping on, obeying the little and the big things, doing the best we can and then continuing to march on, trusting God to do the rest.

Perseverance isn’t a lot of fun. Yet it is perseverance that allows God to take our muddled messes and turn them into miracles. He delights in transforming the black-carbon pressures of our life into diamonds of radiant beauty. But doing all that requires a process. A process that takes time. A process that is sometimes painful.

For us caught in the busyness of life, there is a version of the Twenty-third psalm from Japan entitled “The Lord is My Pace Setter”:

The Lord is my pace setter … I shall not rush

He makes me stop for quiet intervals

He provides me with images of stillness which restore my serenity

He leads me in the way of efficiency through calmness of mind and his guidance is peace

Even though I have great many things to accomplish each day, I will not fret, for his presence is here

His timelessness, his all importance will keep me in balance

He prepares refreshment and renewal in the midst of my activity by anointing my mind with his oils of tranquility

My cup of joyous energy overflows

Truly harmony and effectiveness shall be the fruits of my hours for I shall walk in the Pace of my Lord and dwell in his house for ever.