It’s Christmas Eve This is Christmas Eve, and throughout the world, Christmas preparations are underway, everywhere. Homes are being made ready for Christmas guests. Churches are colorful with Christmas decorations. Streets are filled with parcel-laden people and there is an air of expectation everywhere. All this festive brightness, this outer preparation of Christmas, speaks the universal language of love, love that gives, love that is devoted to making someone happy. These pre-Christmas days have been very precious, I’m sure, to many of us. Somehow, the Spirit of Christmas lifts us out of ourselves, and makes us members for a while of one great family, sharing God’s Gift, as we exchange our tangible gifts. Stranger meets stranger and everyone feels kindlier toward his neighbor at this time of the year. Why is this, I wonder? Possibly, because people are a little closer to God in thought and action at this time. More people are thinking about goodwill and peace and are giving tokens of affection to others. More people are united in a singleness of purpose, purpose that is good. At Christmastime, we see what happens when each person deals from the depth of himself or herself and expresses it to the depth in other persons. It’s a wonderful time. You know, the real Christmas gift is not wrapped in paper or tied with ribbons. Wrapped packages are, simply, symbols. The real gift is within us. The gifts that are shopped for and wrapped and given are the tangible symbols of an innate feeling of love. Mary placed the symbol of God’s Eternal Universal Gift in the manger in Bethlehem. But, it was not the baby of flesh and blood that those who came to the stable bowed down for and worshipped. It was not only the little one there, in all his lovely innocence, that made them burn within. It was an awareness within themselves of the Great Gift, the Divinity within, their own Christ Indwelling. It is the rising response in the heart of another to the gift of love in ours. It is this that makes Christmas, or perhaps, makes Hanukkah. Oh, I know there are a lot of Scrooges around. Many of them who say, I don’t get any kick out of Christmas anymore, or It’s just another commercial advertising stunt to get people to go into debt for Christmas gifts. Well, it’s true that Christmas exists only in the minds and hearts of those who are interested in it. Those who think of Christmas only from the commercial angle or of work and the hardship that Christmas activities may bring, truly, may miss the Spirit of Christmas. This beautiful holiday really celebrates the birth of one whose chief purpose was to give, even to the giving of himself, for the good of mankind. And, while we are thinking about Scrooge, I like to give Scrooge a break. I think he’s had a bum wrap. We’ve always thought of Scrooge as a materialistic, hard-hearted, cruel person, but the story of the Christmas carol doesn’t depict this. It depicts the metamorphosis of a man who finally came out and became a wonderful person, who did so much for Tiny Tim and for Bob Cratchett, and perhaps, beyond that, to everyone. He was a changed person. So, let’s try not to use the word Scrooge with a negative connotation, because Scrooge, in his final state, was a beautiful human being. And, if some of us cannot make contact with this Diviner Spirit, except one day a year, then this day may help us to keep alive, in our hearts, a little spark of that Christ Spirit, which may someday burst into a spreading light. So I say, let’s make the most of it. Let’s realize where the Spirit of Christmas originates. It’s not a gift, but what the gift symbolizes for the giver that makes the holiday such a beautiful success. For weeks before Christmas, many persons spend themselves—their thought, their time, their energy, and their money—in a whirlwind of preparation for outer activities. Quite often, many of us become so busy with outer things, so absorbed in materiality, that our consciousness appears to be closed to the Divine Impulse that, actually, would leap into life within us, if it could just find a time when it had our attention. Some preparation in the outer is necessary, of course, especially, of holiday benefits for the poor, which also engage both time and thought. But, never is there a need to give any of these activities first attention, or to become so absorbed in any preparation that the mind becomes crystallized in it. Preparation for Christmas should always mean something more, something transcendent. He who can meet the various demands of the Christmas Season with the least physical and mental strain, and still give the most joy with his gifts, he is the person who gives himself, first, to the True Spirit of the Season, that of surrendering himself to the giver, and receiving from him the rich gift of himself, with his accompanying strength and power and joy. We need, always, at all seasons, to give ourselves to times of meditation about the depth of life, about the real Principles of living, so that we can, consciously, receive from the Source of All Life the things that satisfy the Inner Person. The Christ Spirit, the Diviner Self, stirs mightily in the soul of every person at this season. The Christ is seeking to awaken each one to a realization of the image that was implanted in him before the very beginning of time, seeking to remind him that he was given the power to evolve this image, to unfold the Christ within himself. When a person has learned to listen, deeply within, the recognition of this urge and to give himself to it fully, then there will be released in exaltation of feeling and a glory of seeing that which cannot be expressed verbally. A new birth ever awaits those who make themselves ready for it. A birth on a higher, and yet higher, plane of consciousness. And, you know, every birth upon a higher plane of consciousness must be preceded by some kind of a time of preparation. The mind must be purified of earthly things, by magnifying that which is good, that which is Holy and full and complete. So, spend some time in preparation for the outer celebration of Christmas or Hanukkah or whatever else you are celebrating, to spend some time in inner preparation, which means to celebrate yourself. Meditate much on all the qualities that you feel are a part of the Christ Consciousness, such as, love, faith, kindness, good fellowship, service to your fellow man, forgiveness, life, and peace. Name them over in your heart and think of how they apply to you and to all of your affairs. So, this is our message to you on this Christmas Eve…and a very, very special Christmas blessing to each one of you. © Eric Butterworth
Posted on: Thu, 25 Dec 2014 17:05:43 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015