Friends, here is another selection from the UCC Daily Devotions which arrive in my email box every morning. Some are better than others, some can be thought provoking, others poignant, some I don’t get. Regardless they are something to look forward to. I once heard we only need three things in life. To have someone to love, to be loved, and have something to look forward to. I don’t know why that stuck with me but it has and so I offer it to you this Advent season of anticipation of good things. – Rev. Sara
P.S. If you would like to subscribe to the UCC Daily Devotions here is the link to provide your contact information. Scroll down a smidge on the page when you get there and you’ll see it – and it’s free! https://www.ucc.org/daily-devotional/
About Those Christmas Lights – Rachel Hackenburg
Thus says the Lord: Again you shall take your tambourines, and go forth in the dance of the merrymakers. Again you shall plant vineyards on the mountains of Samaria; the planters shall plant, and shall enjoy the fruit. -Jeremiah 31:2a, 4b-5 (NRSV)
I love Christmas lights. String them across your windows on the day after Thanksgiving- fabulous! Weave them through trees and bushes in your yard on the day after Halloween, even- delightful! Bring on the small white lights, twinkling through long winter nights. Let there be colorful bulbs wrapped around gates and fences, blazing like commercialized Northern Lights. Shine a light on upside-down Santa Claus legs in the chimney. Turn on the bright nose of a blow-up Rudolph. Set up a glowing display of candy canes or penguins or baby Jesuses. I’m here for it!
But please, no matter how early you indulge in the joyful glow of Christmas, I’m begging you now: don’t be in a rush to put away all that bright plastic immediately after December 25th. Let the light linger. Allow a bit of garnish décor to carry the joy of Christmas into January. Perhaps even February. Because I, for one, continue to need beacons of hope long after the Christmas presents have been put away. I continue to long for a glimmer of wonder long after the Christmas tree has dropped all its needles and foiled the vacuum’s best efforts.
The good news that leads us like a reindeer’s red nose through Advent; the good news that delivers extravagant joy at Christmas; that same good news does not dim with the dawning of December 26th. That same good news is no less captivating, no less ostentatious, no less foolish and fun just because the stores end their holiday sales. Keep those Christmas lights burning a little longer this year, remembering that the good news is like a long and loud tambourine dance, an outrageously abundant feast, and a bright light of love that outshines every grief of injustice.
Prayer: Keep the lamp within my soul trimmed and burning, O Faithful God, so that my joy in your love overflows.
