Winter Star

My Christmas morning drive to the family's house was met with beautiful rays of the rising sun breaking through greyscale clouds across the lake. It held a beauty in the stillness and radiant contrast of dark and light. Now, the merry Christmas days fold into the end of year days, still in the midst of winter, still in the mindset of Christmas, which does continue until Epiphany. May Christmas last within us long after the decorations get put away. 

Winter Star

Slow the pace for days ahead
Call to a deep within you
Cherished hours of dear time spent
Coloured in shades brilliant in hue.
Sparkle and light, oh bright night!
Illuminated by planets and stars,
Glimpses of ancient prophesy
Comes down to where we are.
Journey with a star, follow its path,
Rise where it leads, quicken your pace,
Create space for the coming king,
Lowly, unexpected; the plan of grace.

Music on Christmas Morning

 

When I was growing up, Christmas morning was always a magical time - all the anticipation had been building for the good news of great joy, and the night before we celebrated with a candle-lit service at church where the story was shared again, along with singing the old hymns with modern voices. Then with the delivery of gifts under the Christmas tree, comes another delivery into our world. He came down to us, as an infant and gentiles (Magi) travelled from far to worship him and offer gifts. I had always wondered why we give gifts as a child, and this answered that pondering. As Lancelot Andrewes wrote in his Christmas sermon of 1622 that he preached in front of King James:

Christ was made poor to make us rich, and so ‘offering gifts’ comes very fit.  There now remains nothing but to include ourselves, and bear our part with them, and with the angels, and all who this day adored Him.  The Magi were Gentiles. So are we. We are to ‘go, and do likewise.’ We cannot say ‘we have seen His star’; the star is gone long since, not now to be seen. Yet I hope for all that, ‘we come to worship.’ [Let] the same day-star be risen in our hearts that was in theirs. For then it will bring us whither it brought them, to Christ.

The Magi followed a star, and may we do the same, though it be risen in our hearts not in the sky. We also are part of the Christmas story today, all these centuries later. In our small ways, we propel the story forward in our participation. 

As the rush of pre-Christmas settles down to Christmas Eve and Christmas, may there be a quiet rising of the star in your heart, something deeper sinking in as the love of God rises.

And on Christmas morning, we can hear the music and hear the words with deeper meaning, from old days of tidings and joy.

I've been reading through the Brontë sisters' poems lately, a lovely book my friend gave me. Anne's Christmas poem stuck out to me as a new favourite, as one I have been reading several times as we lead up to Christmas. 

I'll let Anne's wondrous words lead us into the these Christmas days. Merry Christmas!

Music On Christmas Morning

Anne Brontë

Music I love—but never strain

Could kindle raptures so divine,

So grief assuage, so conquer pain,

And rouse this pensive heart of mine—

As that we hear on Christmas morn,

Upon the wintry breezes borne.

Though Darkness still her empire keep,

And hours must pass, ere morning break;

From troubled dreams, or slumbers deep,

That music KINDLY bids us wake:

It calls us, with an angel's voice,

To wake, and worship, and rejoice;

To greet with joy the glorious morn,

Which angels welcomed long ago,

When our redeeming Lord was born,

To bring the light of Heaven below;

The Powers of Darkness to dispel,

And rescue Earth from Death and Hell.

While listening to that sacred strain,

My raptured spirit soars on high;

I seem to hear those songs again

Resounding through the open sky,

That kindled such divine delight,

In those who watched their flocks by night.

With them I celebrate His birth—

Glory to God, in highest Heaven,

Good-will to men, and peace on earth,

To us a Saviour-king is given;

Our God is come to claim His own,

And Satan's power is overthrown!

A sinless God, for sinful men,

Descends to suffer and to bleed;

Hell MUST renounce its empire then;

The price is paid, the world is freed,

And Satan's self must now confess

That Christ has earned a RIGHT to bless:

Now holy Peace may smile from heaven,

And heavenly Truth from earth shall spring:

The captive's galling bonds are riven,

For our Redeemer is our king;

And He that gave his blood for men

Will lead us home to God again.

Merry Festive Reading

 

Merry festive reading to you!

Do you have any books on your reading list for this time around Christmas? Ones that you want to read - or re-read each year? 

Still on my list I'd like to re-read in the coming week or two include A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, of course, the absolute classic and the book that is credited with infusing into culture the ways we celebrate Christmas, even today. Also, The Nutcracker by E.T.A. Hoffmann. Last year was the first year I read The Nutcracker, and I think it will be one that I want to read each year.

Until those books are re-visited, here are the ones I have already been reading. I embracing the season with the good books that bring me right into the snowy and wintry landscapes, cheer, and mystery.

Jane Austen's Christmas - The Festive Season in Georgian England, edited by Maria Hubert

Traditions from the time of Jane Austen, with excerpts from her novels, her letters to and from family,  recipes, poems, and other letters and diary entries to get a sense of that time period and how they celebrated. Games families played were quite different from what we might consider today - such as apple bobbing. Isn't that a Halloween thing? Recipes are also quite interesting to read (and not try out, I am not so brave).

I loved learning more about the Twelfth Night Festivities, such traditions we do not even talk about today - from the last evening of Christmas to the Feast of Epiphany (when the wise men visited). Would you like to play Snapdragon, which involved popping raisins into your mouth from a bowl of flaming brandy?  You'd have a bowl flaming and reach your hands in to grab a raisin. Yes, this was a children's game. Popular from the sixteenth century. Maybe after you have some bullet pudding. 

Winters in the World, Eleanor Parker

I am re-reading this one, all the Winter sections, as it does travel through the seasons from the Anglo-Saxon world. It's absolutely delightful and fascinating to me. The literature, poetry, beliefs, traditions, and language. Winter is an invading force that comes quickly into their world, taking the world by storm, so to speak. The language finds beauty in all things about the turning year. We see the seasons changing and the importance of how it shapes their world. In a time that depending on the weather for survival, harvests, and livelihood, they paid such close attention to the gifts of each season.

After (All Saint's Day) comes Winter's Day, far and wide,
six nights later, and seizes sun-bright autumn
with its army of ice and snow,
fettered with frost by the Lord's command,
so that the green fields may not longer stay with us,
the ornaments of the earth.

The Wood at Midwinter, Susanna Clarke

Susanna's newest book, a short story beautifully illustrated. A fantasy tale inspired from myths and stories of saints. It is another crossover kind of story, like Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, where the real world and the world of fairy intertwine, and characters cross over. Strange indeed, and though provoking. A young girl gives up everything to raise a baby cub. In doing so, attempts to heal a brokenness between the natural world and man.

As Susanna writes in her afterword "In my own writing I had become fascinated by characters who are bridges between different worlds, between different states of being, characters who feel compelled to try and reconcile the unreconcilable."

The World of Xmas

 

We live in a world of Xmas.

Once upon a time in a parallel world imagined by C.S. Lewis (or simply an observance of our own world), we lived a preparatory period of 50 days leading up to a festival of Xmas. This festival made out to be a fun and happy time, but had requirements like filling the shops to buy gifts and cards for every person you know, or half-know, weary and exhausted, but as part of the sale adverts you must follow the trends and get gifts that are popular and wanted by all. Which means fighting crowds at the shops. It's a whole rushed experience because you are pushed around the long halls of shopping malls in pursuit of the sale.

This means, of course, you're quite emptied in spirit and in wallet, and have loads on credit cards to foster such purchases, and as we approach the main event, you're exhausted and irritated, so you spend half the day of the event in bed and/or your pajamas, trying to recover from overeating, overspending, and overdrinking. But that's all part of the event festivities encouraged.

Yet another event, a holiday is celebrated the same day, called Christmas and it is kind of the opposite of Xmas, in which the folks who celebrate wake early, dress nicely, and attend service joy-filled and focused on worship of one they call Creator. A story is told of a baby born and the young mother is seen as blessed above all women, yet she's in a dirty barn with her baby and receives unexpected visitors who travel from afar and have vastly different approaches to living. They want to bring gifts or sit there in adoration of the baby. The light shines brightly on Christmas as the Light has come into the world.

Yet, collide these two events do, on the same day. One affects the moment, a fleeting time of pleasure followed by regret of overindulging in various ways, and the other is never lacking and always filled to the brim with an everlasting joy not able to be purchased with coupons clipped. With one, we are glad when its over as we are already wearied of all the "things" and seek to shut it all away as soon as possible. While the other seeks to celebrate for a few weeks after the official event, seeing how it is possible to accept a gift that adds joy more and more the longer you follow. A weariness doesn't come. The light doesn't fade.

For Exmas and the Rush distract the minds even of the few from sacred things. And we indeed are glad that men should make merry at Crissmas; but in Exmas there is no merriment left. 

"Xmas and Christmas" by C.S. Lewis