Taking Back Christmas

Not all Christmas trees have to be green!  Sometimes in December I spray paint bush or tree branches white, and hang some dollar store snowflakes on them.  The best part about snowflake trees is that they don't have to disappear once Christmas is over...they can stay up through January, which is good because the house looks so drab without all the Christmas lights and decorations.

I attend a church that is called a Bible church...basically the doctrine is Baptist.  BUT I was raised a Methodist, and still somewhat follow the Protestant liturgical calendar as a way to order my days and as a tool in my Christian walk.

(You can take the woman out of the Methodist church, but not the Methodist methods out of the woman).

I have been thinking a lot about the 12 days of Christmas, which starts on Christmas Day and ends on Epiphany ( the celebration of the gift of the Magi...or the Three Wise Men) on January 6th.  It seems a bigger deal in the European cultures and the Catholic church, but not so much the Protestant western churches.

Why?  Because our church calendar morphed into the commercial calendar...that says once the Christmas shopping season is over, Christmas is over.

So what's up with that?

During the advent, we prepare our hearts and home for Christmas.  We spend a lot of time getting ready.  But when Christmas Day arrives, it is over so quickly...you are left feeling a little exhausted and a little deflated...which is exactly what rampant and unchecked commercialism will do to you. 

So this year I observed the full 12 days of Christmas.  I took the tree down, but left everything else up.  I still listened to Christmas carols, read Christmas readings (both spiritual and secular) and really pondered what the birth of that child in the manger means to my life, today. 

And for the first time, I felt that I fully experienced Christmas.

Whether you follow the Protestant liturgical calendar or not, consider separating the commercial from the observation of Christmas.  I have tried doing that before Christmas...and in our culture with our traditions it is dang near impossible. 

But if you take the time to fully observe the 12 days of Christmas, STARTING with Christmas day, you will find that the commercial fades away, and the joy will kick in. 

And that, folks, is how you take back Christmas!