Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE

On the eve of our Christmas celebration, many people are doing the last-minute rushing around, wrapping prezzies and having their Christmas Eve socials. Me, I’m sitting here, at home, typing this last entry in the Christmas Advent blog for 2013.

I used to love doing the social circuit at Christmas time. I had spent many years part of an organization that had Christmas pretty much ruined because it was the biggest fundraising drive of the year during this wonderful season. I would drag myself out of bed on Christmas morning after wrapping the children’s presents for hours into the night after they’d all gone to bed. I would actually be glad that it was over.

Now, I actually have a bit of a grieving process every year. I LOVE Christmas. Not because of the presents and rushing around. I love the tone it brings to our world (aside from the commercialism). It brings about a happy tone, a joyful tone. And then after all the prezzies are opened and the push through to New Years is done, all the lights go out, the music stops and we seem to just automatically go back to the same old, same old.

Even before Christianity took over the Yule Tradition it was a time of celebration in many cultures. Families gathered and gifts were exchanged – certainly not X-Box’s, laptops and smartphones! It was a time for family. And that’s what I love about it. Each on of the readings over the last four weeks reminds to be people of HOPE and PEACE and JOY and LOVE. As part of the Advent Wreath the last candle represents LIGHT. It is called the CHRIST CANDLE, because the person, Jesus, came to bring light to a world that was filled with hypocrisy, unnecessary rules and a failed religion.

Many may be offended to know that Jesus did NOT come to establish a new religion. He came to fix his own religion. Strange, so did Buddha and many others who have come to show us enlightenment.

What is this enlightenment. Well look at the word for a second. It contains the word LIGHT. It is not a destination or achievement as some would have you think. It is a process. It is the process of shining the LIGHT into our own lives and seeing ourselves for who we really are. It is the process of looking at the path we are on to see if it is the most beneficial for ourselves and those around us. It begs the questions:

• Am I bringing HOPE to an otherwise hopeless world?


• Am I bringing PEACE to a violent society?


• Am I bringing JOY where there is sorrow?


• Am I the embodiment of LOVE to those who believe there is no love?

The truth for me is that I am and I am not. The truth for you may be different but probably not. Some days I don’t feel like I’m embodying any of these qualities, but I really am. Some days I am cranky. Some days I am just not ‘right’. Does that mean that I don’t embody the LIGHT. No, not really. It just means that the LIGHT looks a bit different on those days. In the Bible it says in Matthew 5, verse 16,

Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

It’s true that some days I’m not all light and fluffy. But I can still exude that LIGHT from within. I can tell people that I’m not feeling up to par and that will give me integrity. And if on that day I offend someone I can go back and clean it up. That is who, even on the crummy days I can shine the LIGHT. But on those wonderfully joyous days when I feel full of HOPE, PEACH, JOY and LOVE I will choose to let my light shine before ALL men in such a way that they WILL see my good works…

Many blessings to you and yours at this time of year.
Thank you for following me here. I am honoured that you do.

James

 

Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE