ILLUSTRATIONS FOR A CHRISTMAS CAROL BY YELENA BRYKSENKOVA (SOURCE)
“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach! ”
— Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
“And it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!”
— Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
Celebrate All 12 Days!
I often daydream that before I publish the final daily Advent post (just as I do when I'm writing the Lent Daybook posts) I'll hear a trumpet and see Christ descending from the sky, returning to once and for all make all things new. If this does not happen before Christmas Day, we are given the responsibility to celebrate as if He did. This is no postscript to Advent; this is the Main Event! It's time to pull out the stops, and take on the holy calling of Feasting!
In the past few years, I've written a couple of posts about how our family has learned, failed, and learned again how to keep Christmas well.
12 Ways to Savor the 12 Days of Christmas
Family Liturgies For Christmas & My Mama's Rule For Feasting
Christmas Confessions From An Exhausted Dad {Brian's guest post}
While we feast, we savor!
You'd think the celebrating part would be easier than the waiting. Like all other spiritual practices, though, celebration comes with its own comforts and challenges. How do we stay present to the feast without our underdeveloped senses dulling too quickly? How do we keep a soft, pliable grasp on the delights of Christmas, rather than trying to pin the legs of the thing down into some sort of worn-out wonder?
I don't know. I've only just begun to ask the question.
Because of Christ's first coming, and in anticipation for his second, our waiting -- good, bad, or ugly -- turns to celebration. Between what we've learned about waiting during Advent, and anticipating the feasting of Christmastide, we hope to walk through these days thoughtfully, joyfully, and graciously.
All of this leads to the Great Festival of Christmastide - a prolonged feasting that lasts twelve whole days. As with Advent, we've learned a lot about how to live this celebration liturgically. (I've written about it here: 12 Ways to Practice 12 Days of Christmas )
Christmas Daybook Meditations
The 12 daily devotional posts for Christmastide are available to those who subscribe to the Daybook Meditations ($5 a month) membership.
Subscribe to A Sacramental Life Daybook Meditations to receive curated collections of Scripture readings, music, art, prayer, and simple spiritual practices to help you look, listen, pray, and do daily practices of worship, love, and beauty. You'll receive a daily meditation during Advent, Christmastide, Lent, and the Easter Octave and each Sunday for the rest of the year to help you pay attention to God's presence in both the silence, celebration, fasting, and feasting of the liturgical year.
In the spirit of Christmastide’s celebration, I welcome you to walk through the 12 days with attention to feasting and joy.
If you enjoy the Christmastide Daybook series, please invite your friends to subscribe too! The Daybook Meditations provide a beautiful experience to be able to share and talk about together. If you’re on Instagram, you and your friends can also follow me there - a_sacramental_life.
Please feel free to email me your questions.
Christmastide: posts from the archives
Recommended Reading for Christmastide
Henry North and the Gift After Christmas
By Ryan A. Hill
