Ps. 36:9  “For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light do we see light.”

A blessed second day of Christmas to you! 

Many people don’t realize that that the “Twelve Days of Christmas” song refers to the liturgical church calendar, on which Christmas is a season, not just one day.  The modern practice of a single day of celebration is, to us, a sad change.  Our family started celebrating the full twelve days of Christmas when our first children were very young.  Not everyone would have a gift every day; some days there were no gifts, and some days it was just one family gift.  Stretching it out like that had multiple advantages.  It kept Christmas Day from just being Get Presents Day.  Since we open gifts one at a time, so everyone gets to watch and appreciate the gifts given, with five kids and two adults exchanging gifts, plus gifts from grandparents and others, stretching out the gift opening meant that instead of one over-whelmingly long day, in which the kids got wired, tired and cranky – joined by the adults for the tired and cranky part- we could enjoy the gift opening at a leisurely pace.  For the kids, instead of the whole thing turning into an open-one-present-grab-another frenzy , they got to actually enjoy and play with each of their gifts before getting another.  We could take advantage of after-Christmas sales, which was sometimes a real financial plus, and there was no pressure for every mail order to arrive “on time”.  When the oldest kids started forming families of their own, another benefit showed itself:  there’s no pressure about which in-laws to spend “the” holiday with.  Our kids can be with their in-laws for Christmas, and come here for New Years–but-still-Christmas with us!

The one thing that is hard about stretching it out for me is leaving up the decorations.  You see, my mom always had the decorations down and house all thoroughly cleaned by New Years, and there is a great drive in me to do the same.  There’s a great symbolism to starting the new year fresh and clean and tidy.  BUT, if you’re going to celebrate the twelve days of Christmas, you have to leave decorations up.  I do start taking some of them down gradually over the time, but enough of them must remain to be clear that we’re still in the Christmas season.  The last to go are the Advent wreath on the table, where we  light all 5 candles each night with dinner, and the Christmas tree. 

I love our Christmas tree.  (It’s hard to wait till mid-December to put it up, but to have it last well until January 6^th, we can’t put it up too early.)  No two of our ornaments are alike; some are handmade from craft fairs, some commercially bought, a few homemade, like the brown yarn “chocolate fairy” Bethy made for Dad years and years ago, or the cross-stitched ones I gave to beloved relatives that now spend Christmas in heaven.  Each of the kids has their own collection, and we put out a few from each.  (My mom gave each of her grandkids an ornament each year for their first 20 Christmases, which I think is a lovely tradition.)  Each family member also has a plain colored glass ball with their name written on it in glitter.  We usually put rather a lot of tinsel on the tree as well, but this year, for the first time ever, we didn’t.  We now have a kitty, and Kiva looooooves to play with – and eat – such lovely, twirly, dancing temptations.  She has also been batting at some of the lower-hanging ornaments (they’re the kid-friendly, unbreakable ones, so it doesn’t much matter), but hasn’t cared to try actually climbing UP the tree, for which I am thankful!

My favorite part of having a Christmas tree, though, is the lights.  I love all the bright, multicolored lights!  Best of the favorites were the little lights where each bulb had its own pattern of blinking on and off.   We now have LED lights, and, alas, you can’t get LEDs that have individual blinking patterns.  So, we have two strings that have different patterns.  Since the strings are set on different patterns, the whole tree isn’t blinking in unison, but the effect still isn’t the same as the old twinklers.  Such is progress, alas. Nevertheless, I STILL love my lights on my tree.   Coming out to the still-somewhat-dark corner of the living room in the morning and putting the plugs into the outlet so the bright light fills the room instantly cheers up the day.  The lights appear to their best advantage, though, in the evening darkness.  Sometimes I like to turn all the other lights off then and just sit enjoying those lights.  

That’s how we think of light, isn’t it?  Showing up best in the dark.  Tree lights, candlelight, a flashlight beam – although their light output is the same no matter the time on the clock, all seem much brighter in the night than in the day.  We would never think of turning on a light so we could check how another light was working.  The verse from today’s Psalm, though puts a whole different spin on the subject!  The Psalmist says that it is in God’s light that we see light.

Jesus said, “I am the light of the world.”  THE light.  There IS no other.  Paul tells us in II Corinthians that Satan disguises himself as an angel of light, but there is, in fact,no light in him.  Since he is utter darkness, any appearance he gives of light is a mere mirage.  What the world sees as “light” is, in fact, still darkness.   We must be careful that we do not get taken in by what the world counts as “light”.  What does not come from God is not, in fact, light, no matter how it appears, no matter what temporal “good” it may do, no matter what warm, fuzzy feelings it may evoke.  All “light” must be examined in HIS light.

When it comes to seeing spiritual light, be sure The Light is ON!