It Isn't Christmas Until...

We all have a list...you know, those things that define Christmas for us. The list changes as we grow up, but it's sort of amazing to me how much importance we place on memory when it comes to this time of year.

For me, Christmas is a patchwork of memories. When I was a kid, I think I might have said it wasn't Christmas until I had seen "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (which ranks just ahead of "A Garfield Christmas" as my favorite Christmas special). Or maybe it wasn't Christmas until the presents appeared under the tree. In my mind's eye, I still remember many Christmas mornings of shaking presents and trying to figure them out before I opened them. What is that about? Why does it matter if I figured it out first? Just rip the thing open! Oh, yes, and it wasn't Christmas until we watched my grandma carefully unwrap a gift so she could save the paper and use it again.

My home church didn't have Christmas Eve worship when I was growing up. We sometimes had "come and go" communion (which, by the way, I'm not a fan of). I think I was in seminary before I went to my first Christmas Eve candlelight service. It was at that point that I began to wonder how centuries of Christians ever worshipped before "Silent Night" was written. Even though I know it is rife with historical inaccuracies (ask any new mother what the possibility is that Jesus as a baby was quiet), it still fills my heart with joy every time we sing it, every time we lift those candles into the air.

In my first appointment, at High Street Church in Muncie, I got to experience Christmas done right. There was a high value placed on excellence at all times at High Street, thanks to the leadership of Dr. Tom Rough, but it was especially true on Christmas Eve. The music, the candlelight, the message—this was the night of nights and Jesus deserved our best for his birth. I've sought to live that out as I've continued in ministry because the same Jesus still deserves my best, our best.

So for me now, it isn't Christmas until we sing "Silent Night" and lift those candles high in the air. It isn't Christmas until I get to read John 1: "In the beginning was the Word..." And it isn't Christmas until we sing Isaac Watts' wonderful hymn, "Joy to the World" (which he didn't write as a Christmas hymn, but centuries of use have overruled Watts' original intent).

It isn't Christmas until we have heard the good news. All the rest—the decorations, the food, the presents and even the lights—are mere trappings. This season is about Jesus, the baby of Bethlehem. Nothing more and nothing less.

Ultimately, it isn't Christmas until Jesus is born in you and me again.