Christmas Carol of the Month - February

Of all the Christmas carols, my favorites are the story carols. The carols with verses and choruses are sung most often, and the choruses are easy to remember, but I like to follow the story all the way through. If you omit a verse or two with the other carols, it's usually OK unless it's someone's favorite verse, but if you omit a verse in a story carol, you've just left out part of the story. See if that's not true in
We Three Kings (5 verses)
The First Noel (6 verses)

The carol I picked for February is While Shepherds Watched their Flocks by Night.
It tells the part of the Christmas story that focuses on the angelic announcement of Christ's birth to the shepherds. "We Three Kings" tells the Christmas story from the kings' point of view. "The First Noel" spends one verse on the shepherds, the next four verses on the Wise Men (kings), and the last verse imploring a response from us.

The words to While Shepherds Watched their Flock by Night were written by Nahum Tate who was Poet Laureate in the reign of Queen Ann. He was one of the first to paraphrase scripture into verse to be used in the church. Before that, only scripture was used. His poem was set to a tune by George Friedrich Handel. The first four verses tell the story. The last verse is the praise of the angelic chorus surrounding the announcing angel, but, in my mind, seems appropriate for the shepherds as well upon seeing the infant Savior, Christ the Lord, for themselves.

While shephers watched their flocks by night, all seated on the ground,
The angel of the Lord came down, and glory shone around.

"Fear not!" said he, for mighty dread had seized their troubled mind;
"Glad tidings of great joy I bring to you and all mankind.

"To you in David's town this day is born, of David's line,
The Savior, who is Christ the Lord, and this will be the sign:

"The heavenly Babe you there shall find to human view displayed,
All meanly wrapt in swathing-bands and in a manger laid.

"All glory be to God on high, and to the earth be peace:
Good will henceforth from heaven to men begin and never cease!"

May God's peace be true in your life, too, because of His gift to all mankind.
Paulita

Christmas Made Me Sick

Every Christmas season for about 7 years (we counted them one time) I was sick. My birthday falls four days before Christmas, so I was either sick on my birthday or Christmas. I'm not sure why this happened year after year, but here are some possibilities:

1. Maybe I was allergic to the indoor Christmas tree. We have an artificial tree now and I'm rarely ill during the Christmas season. But allergy and sickness are different. As I remember I ran a fever and had to stay in bed in my bedroom. Isolation of germs was the theory then.

2. Maybe I was allergic to mold spores from the rain, or smoke from the fireplace. (Both are true today.)

3. Maybe there was too much excitement from the anticipation of my birthday, Christmas, and two weeks' vacation from school.

4. Maybe I caught stuff from other kids who were sick. This is probably the reason because as Pasteur proved, germs don't just appear. There was a lot of hand holding in games at school and I don't remember too many admonitions to wash hands except when you used the restroom, and I don't remember EVER using a school restroom! (another story)

I got my bicycle for Christmas when I was 9 years old. Daddy parked it between my sister's and my twin beds. (My sister had moved to another room for the duration of my sicknes.) Every time I got up during the day to go to the bathroom, I was allowed to sit on the bicycle seat for a few minutes. I think it was an incentive to get well faster.

P.S. I still had the same Christmas-season problem when I was in college. My major was Vocal Music. Consequently, I had a high level of anxiety regarding Christmas programs. I was always afraid I'd have laryngitis and wouldn't be able to sing, and I loved the soprano solos in the Messiah.

SO I'm reconsidering my choice above, and I vote for #3.
Paulita

Christmas Dinner at Grandma's

Christmas dinner at Grandma's was always the same. The table was set with Mother's best China and long-stemmed glasses. Three leaves were added to stretch the table, but even at that, we often had a "kid's table" in the adjacent closed-in porch.

The menu, which never varied, included a huge turkey with Italian spinach dressing. There were mounds of mashed potatoes and a silver gravy boat with thick turkey gravy. Of course we had cranberry sauce (the jellied kind) and also frozen green peas to complete the Christmas colors. The only salad we ate was jello salad, usually lime jello with crushed pinapple and cottage cheese. But the dish that set our dinner apart from any others was raviolas. To this day I still make raviolas from scratch for Christmas. Daddy served a sweet, dark, red wine in stemmed wine glasses to the adults.

After the dinner dishes were cleared off the table Mother brought in dessert: pumpkin pies, a mincemeat pie, and persimmon pudding with lemon sauce. Daddy brought out a box of Italian almond candies wrapped in little individual boxes. It was a once a year treat which he kept hidden until after dinner.

Most of us waited until later for pie because we had already sampled Mother's chocolate fudge, divinity, meringues, and peanut brittle which were on the coffee table in the living room and the buffet in the dining room.

How we ate all that food I'll never know, but it was our traditional family feast and we were celebrating Christmas day.

Born in a Manger to be Your Valentine

This is Valentine's week, the time when everyone is scrambling to find the best Valentine to send or give to their beloveds. God is in the Valentine business, too. He offers the same one to each of us.
"God so loved the world that He gave his one and only son that whoever believes in Him, might not perish but have everlasting life."
Remember that baby in the Christmas manger? He was and is God's best Valentine to you this year. Will you receive what God has for you? Jesus, the Savior, born in a manger so long ago is alive and wants to be part of your life. He wants to be your Valentine.
Paulita