Thanksgiving and Christmas are upon us.  I can’t say they have snuck up on me, since I’ve known they are coming from the beginning of the year.  We should pace ourselves for these Holy-days, but, of course, life gets in the way. Personally, a Centennial for our church loomed over me all year – the remodeling foreshadowed the Centennial.  Lining up speakers for the service and the videos, the food, the music, have all been long in the making. Thanksgiving and Christmas, well, they could wait.

And here they are!  I am looking forward to them.  We have much to thank the Lord for, and Jesus’ birthday carries the weight of eternal salvation, not just a bunch of to-dos before midnight on Christmas Eve.

A concern I have this year, maybe because of the Centennial, is that I am going to do the same things I have done year after year.  Not that traditions are bad, not that traditions should change, but that I am going to do them in a perfunctory way, a series of things I have to do just because, well, I did it that way last year (or the last 100 years, or whatever).  I have put this all in the first person so as not to drag you into this. If I say “we are going to do them in a perfunctory way,” it sounds like I’m talking about the church, or you and me, but I am simply thinking about my own approach to Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I imagine you can relate.

There is a difference between rituals and superstition.  For a bride to wear “Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue” is a superstition.  Lighting a unity candle at the wedding is a ritual.  Carrying a rabbit’s foot is superstition. Starting your day with devotions is a ritual.  An elf on the shelf is superstition. Lighting an Advent wreath is a ritual.  You may think of personal examples.  A Christmas tree, uhm… ritual or superstition?

I don’t have an answer for that last one.  On the one hand, why do we fell a tree and bring it inside and add
electrical lights to it? (They used to add lighted candles!)  On the other hand, decorating it as a family is some kind of ritual for us. But I want to make this year more intentional about rituals. Not just traditions, and not just superstitions, but rituals. A ritual points beyond itself (think the meaning of the five candles of the Advent wreath).  A superstition says that the action or object itself has magical powers (think wearing dirty socks wins the game for the athlete).  A ritual is about somebody else.  Superstition is about self.

I hope we will all find meaning in the rituals of these days. I pray that we will actively seek the rituals—rituals of old—so that they might point us to the Lord.  And I pray that the Holy Spirit permeates our Holy-days and blesses them that we might celebrate the goodness of God in these eventful days.

Running to Publix,

Craig

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever.  1 Chronicles 16:34