Keeping Christmas
by Henry van Dyke
Henry van Dyke was a member of the clergy, this story reads like a sermon for good reason. Its full title is A Short Christmas Sermon: Keeping Christmas. Van Dyke also composed lyrics to the popular hymn, "The Hymn of Joy" sung to Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, "Ode to Joy."
ROMANS, xiv, 6: He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord.
It is a good thing to observe Christmas day. The mere marking of times and seasons, when men agree to stop work and make merry together, is a wise and wholesome custom. It helps one to feel the supremacy of the common life over the individual life. It reminds a man to set his own little watch, now and then, by the great clock of humanity which runs on sun time.
But there is a better thing than the observance of Christmas day, and that is, keeping Christmas.
Are you willing...
- to forget what you have done for other people, and to remember what other people have done for you;
- to ignore what the world owes you, and to think what you owe the world;
- to put your rights in the background, and your duties in the middle distance, and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground;
- to see that your fellow-men are just as real as you are, and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy;
- to own that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life, but what you are going to give to life;
- to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe, and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness--are you willing to do these things even for a day?
- Then you can keep Christmas.
Are you willing...
- to stoop down and consider the needs and the desires of little children;
- to remember the weakness and loneliness of people who are growing old;
- to stop asking how much your friends love you, and ask yourself whether you love them enough;
- to bear in mind the things that other people have to bear on their hearts;
- to try to understand what those who live in the same house with you really want, without waiting for them to tell you;
- to trim your lamp so that it will give more light and less smoke, and to carry it in front so that your shadow will fall behind you;
- to make a grave for your ugly thoughts, and a garden for your kindly feelings, with the gate open--are you willing to do these things even for a day?
- Then you can keep Christmas.
Are you willing...
- to believe that love is the strongest thing in the world--stronger than hate, stronger than evil, stronger than death--and that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem nineteen hundred years ago is the image and brightness of the Eternal Love?
- Then you can keep Christmas.
And if you keep it for a day, why not always?
But you can never keep it alone.
You might enjoy two more favorite works of VanDyke: The Other Wise Man and The First Christmas Tree. Find these and many of his other short stories here: https://americanliterature.com/author/henry-van-dyke
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