Dear Church Family and Friends,
When I was growing up, my family had a number of Christmas traditions, especially on Christmas Eve. After dinner, we would first attend the evening candle light service at our church. Then, all three of us kids would pile into the backseat of the car, wrap ourselves in blankets, and sing Christmas carols in loud out of tune voices as we drove down Candle Stick Lane, a street where all the houses are bedecked with Christmas lights and decorations. When we finally came home, we would gather near the Christmas tree to drink homemade eggnog and eat Christmas cookies while listening to the likes of Harry Belafonte, Nat King Cole, and Johnny Mathis sing Christmas classics.
Our Christmas Eve gathering also had one Berndt family peculiarity. Like many families, we had a German Christmas carousel. For those unfamiliar with these carousels, they are wood carved toys that position candles in such a way that their heat causes a pinwheel above them to spin. For some reason, however, our carousel was deficient in this regard. Our burning candles failed to propel the wooden pinwheel. The pinwheel would not move at all and thus risked becoming burned by the heat. While other families might have simply thrown the malfunctioning toy away, our family made a new tradition out of it. Every Christmas Eve, one of us would sit next to the carousel and diligently keep the pinwheel spinning through the careful intervention of our fingers every 30 seconds while the rest of family moaned about the need to give it up.
Like our carousel, it sometimes takes effort to keep a Christmas tradition going, but in the end, I believe the price paid is often more than worth it. Christmas is about the story of God’s love coming into the world in the unique form of a baby who was born in a manager to Mary and Joseph and who was greeted with joy by shepherds and wise men. It thus makes sense that Christmas should be a time of traditions that draw families and friends together in a spirit of laughter, joy, and love.
May the delights of Christmas traditions fill all of your lives this Christmas season.
Your brother in Christ,
Pastor Brooks