Christmas Eve 2008

We celebrated Christmas Eve at home this year with several TTC students joining us for dinner. We shared food and stories from Myanmar, Philippines, China and Malaysia. Afterward, I sat at the piano and we sang a few Christmas songs. Some of our guests, who have been away from home and family for a long time, expressed appreciation for the hospitality.

Well, it's easy to be nostalgic at this time of year, given the close extended family of my own upbringing.

I recall how in my younger days that Christmas Eve always started with the service of candle-lighting service at First church. There the Christmas story was rehearsed in Scripture readings, congregational singing, anthems and solos. Preaching was minimal. The story was enacted with the extinguishing of the lights. Then the pastor read, in the dimness of one candle, the words of John 1, "In the beginning was the Word..." As the candle light was slowly passed down the aisles to each person, we began singing "Silent Night." Finally we burst out with "Joy to the World." We have moved satisfyingly through a range of human emotions, from longing to fulfillment.

Following the service all the extended family gathered at one of the homes for potluck dinner and fellowship. The evening always closed with those who wished gathering around Uncle Verne at the piano, singing the old favorites in German and English.

I learned later from Aunt Ruth that the tradition of singing on Christmas Eve sprang from the the old German Church practice of caroling until late on Christmas Eve.

Here's to those who continue the old song by ever singing the "new" song as called for in Psalms 96 and 98.

"Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad;
let the sea resound, and all that is in it;

let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them.
Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy;

they will sing before the LORD, for he comes,
he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples in his truth." -Psalm 96

--georgos

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