Scrooge understood Christmas and could not wait to go to work and celebrate with Cratchitt. Let’s imitate him this last quarter of Christmas.
For many Americans, this is the first day of a “regular work week” in some time. Secular America works in the week before Christmas, the week twixt Christmas and New Year’s, but often slowly. Hours are “adjusted.” Office routine gets filled with parties.
No more of that. Like every farmer who lived for almost all of history (meaning almost all our ancestors) and like many American workers throughout the season, most of us are back to our normal schedules while still in the midst of the Holidays! Christmas Day for my West Virginia ancestors included farm chores and if we get a few more days off, few get all of Christmas to rest.
This is a chance to be for something in our workplaces that is rare: merriment, jollification, and work with joy.
There is never a better time to say: “Merry Ninth Day of Christmas!” Like Scrooge, treat a c0-worker to a steaming bowl of Christmas punch. Give a gift to charity and celebrate the season. We are now to the entire quarter of Christmas only celebrated by Christians.
This is our chance to give merriment to those who may be facing post-Holiday blues.
The number nine sometimes symbolizes judgment in Scripture, but also new beginnings. It is no accident that Tolkien gives “mortal man doomed to die” nine rings. Left to ourselves, humankind can only extend our lives by becoming wraiths . . . pale images of what we were and much less than we could be. Yet there is another way, we could accept our finitude and move on to eternity.
Jerusalem falls and exile begins, but the return starts from that moment. Only victory is eternal in Scripture if we side with God . . . our defeats in this life are preparatory to joyous restoration. We have to admit we are not perfect and need God. We must face our defeat, but then God stands ready to give us not one gift, but nine.
God gives us nine gifts after He begins to rebuild our lives:
22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.
The fruit, the natural production, of the Spirit of God are these nine. Self-control enables us to enjoy God’s blessings without destroying the good with excess. Gentleness is art of knowing what is appropriate and what is inappropriate. Faithfulness enables me to keep loving what is lovable. Generosity keeps me from hording the fruit until it rots: I give and so multiply the fruit around me. Kindness is leading with mercy and not with judgment, even just judgment. Patience is not merely enduring, but seeing what will be and not only what is. The patient man lives in hope, and so experiences peace and joy. Peace is rooted in the unchanging image of Eternity, the work of Jesus in our hearts. Joy is happiness, becoming fully human.
All of this is captured by love, triggered by the beauty of God’s creations and then leading to God. We long for the unchanging, absolute romance found in God. It is what every pleasure, every good thing, is a foretaste of.
We can spend the Ninth Day of Christmas bringing the nine fruits of the Spirit, but especially love to our fellow mortal men doomed to die.
Rejoice!
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In