On The Seventh Day Of Christmas: A Sobering Post Of Christmas Past

Launching another of WalMart's mammoth cargo ships

How Christmas Excesses Harm Our Planet And Threaten Our Future 

Our appetite for cheap Christmas gifts and other manufactured products from China and other developing countries requires massive numbers of huge cargo ships to bring us all the stuff our consumer appetites demand. These giant freighters use a  frightening amount of fuel, and together discharge more carbon pollution than all of the cars in the world, according to an article in the Daily Mail, and they mostly return to their home ports empty.

Then there is the enormous environmental harm done by the coal consumption and other resources needed to manufacture all of these goods in far away places like China, resulting in it becoming one of the most polluted countries in the world. According to a recent study cited in the Guardian, 1.6 million Chinese die each year of exposure to intolerable levels of pollution in their atmosphere and water supply. That's 4000 deaths per day in China alone, which provides 91% of all of WalMart's products, as one example.

But aren't we helping poorer countries economically by buying all of these manufactured products in huge numbers?

Well, yes and no. Any economic system that depends on the overconsumption by some for the financial survival of others is neither moral or sustainable. Thus we need to find more creative and God-honoring ways to celebrate the birth and life of Christ than by buying ever more quantities of things--mostly stuff we'd all be better off without.

From National Geographic's "How Much is US To Blame For "Made-in-China" Pollution?

On the Sixth Day Of Christmas: Another Favorite Post Of Christmas Past

A Lin Wellford rock painting

An Amazing Kind of Manger Power

The Advent story in Luke’s gospel begins by naming the head of the major super power of the day, the Roman empire's Caesar Augustus. He issues a decree that "all the world should be taxed” and the writer notes that this census was first taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And in Matthew’s gospel King Herod, puppet governor of Roman-occupied Judea, is named as well.

These were ruthless, powerful men under whose occupation rebellions were met with brutal force. Subjects who dared to defy them were crucified, beaten or beheaded as a way of keeping the population intimidated and under submission.

And like many monarchs of his time, Emperor Caesar Augustus claimed to be a divine son of God, and a God himself, with titles like "Lord", "God from God", "Liberator"and "Savior of the World". So the early gospel writers were placing their lives in jeopardy by claiming divine birth for a child born of a peasant girl in an occupied country, one whose revolutionary and worldwide new kingdom, to be ruled justly by Yahweh alone, was to prevail over the entire earth--just as in heaven itself.

Citizens of such a government, whose treasonous pledge of allegiance is "Jesus is Lord" rather than the required "Caesar is Lord" are frequently martyred for their heresy. And Herod commanded that all male children in the area around Bethlehem be killed out of his fear of a coming rival.

All of which makes Christmas more than just about festivity and merrymaking, but a bold announcement about who, and what power, is really sovereign, a declaration that still divides the world in two.

Two thousand years later no one knows or cares much about the Roman empire's Caesar Augustus or his contemporaries King Herod of Judea or Governor Quirinius of Syria. It is the babe in the manger who still commands the greater allegiance.

From a FLRC Centerpiece radio spot, aired locally on WEMC 91.7 FM at 11:58 am M-F and on Sunday at 7:58, on WBTX 1470 AM at 4:20 M-F and on WNLR 1150 AM at 11:28 am M-W-F.  (posted here December 13, 2014)

On The Fifth Day Of Christmas--A Favorite Post Of Christmas Past

At age six, it was my
most anticipated day
of the year.

An Amish Christmas

I still remember how magical the number 25 seemed on the December calendar in the living room of my childhood home. Our farm family, consisting of two hard-working parents and nine children, was dirt poor, but we celebrated Christmas in a way that could have warmed the heart of Ebenezer Scrooge himself.

Yet by today’s standards it was bare beyond belief. 

So why did we experience such a breath-stopping, adrenaline-rushing, sleep-denying anticipation of Christmas day?

Like other Amish families in our community, we had no Christmas tree, hung no holiday wreaths, displayed no Christmas lights. There were some pine cones and evergreen branches decorating our mantles and window sills, but that was about it. 

The carefully wrapped presents we had made or bought from our meager means were kept in hiding until Christmas morning. We each knew better than to look for such treasures in the weeks prior to the 25th. Snooping would have spoiled the fun and diminished the pleasure of our Advent-long waiting, wondering and guessing. 

The one gift from our parents we could always count on was a plate loaded with hard candy, nuts and an orange for each of us children. What made it priceless was that it was entirely our own, to be savored at leisure or consumed that very day if we wished. Other gifts from our parents were always a surprise, and especially in earlier years, were often homemade. 

For example, my older siblings fondly remember the time during the Depression (just before my birth) my mother made each child a pair of mittens from some reused flannel material. That was their main present. At other times there were homemade rag dolls or doll clothes, or hand made toy tractors or blocks. And it was not unusual to receive practical gifts like socks, scarves or gloves as well.

In later years there might be jigsaw puzzles, coloring books, a set of Tinkertoys or other inexpensive playthings to be shared. Once, wonder of wonders, my Dad splurged on a small wind-up train set for the whole family to enjoy--including himself, of course, an avid train lover and still a child at heart.

Since our trips to town were few and our allowances non-existent, we siblings often made things for each other, like a scrapbook of pictures, an embroidered handkerchief, or a wooden knickknack of some kind, carefully sanded and varnished. Or we gathered up our meager savings and shopped at one the of 5 & 10 cent stores in Waynesboro or Staunton. We knew that each small gift would be cause for great celebration. 

Family devotions on Christmas morning always included the reading of a nativity text, the timeless tale of poor folks like ourselves who were caught up in an event that still heralded “good tidings of great joy” 2000 years later. And like every other morning of the year, we knelt together in our living room as my father led in a prayer of blessing.

Today, when I compare these memories with our current Christmases, involving grandchildren surrounded by mounds of wrapping paper and boxes after having opened an abundance of battery-operated and other high tech purchases, I can’t help wonder who really had the most fun.

With fewer possessions, it takes very little to provide a bundle of pleasure. Each gift is priceless. Add a few more, and the result is even more delight.  But at some point the pleasure curve peaks, levels, and may actually decline. In our efforts to give our children and grandchildren everything we didn’t have, we may fail to give them some of the good things we did have, like experiencing great blessing in receiving small gifts.  

And like the gift of a greater capacity for joy itself.

This is adapted from the column I wrote for the Winter, 2011, issue of LIVING magazine, and posted here December 2, 2011.

On The Fourth Day Of Christmas: A Memorable Post From Christmas Past

The story of my newlywed parents' winter journey by team
and wagon has made the Christmas story more real to me.

Two Journeys: Joseph and Mary, Ben and Mary

My parents were newlyweds when they made a 200-mile move from Thomas, Oklahoma, to Hutchinson, Kansas, with a young team of horses pulling a small canvas-covered wagon loaded with most of their belongings.

It was December 22, 1925, the second day of winter, when my mom and dad, young and adventuresome (and in spite of their parents' grave misgivings), embarked on their seven-day journey, planning to sleep in their wagon each night.
 
All went well until the day after Christmas, when the temperature dropped to 10 below zero on a Sunday morning as they headed north into a bitter prairie wind. My father closed the wagon to try to keep it warmer for his new bride, then got out and walked with the team to keep them moving against the driving wind and to try to stay warm.

My mother’s feet and my Dad’s ears and fingers became frostbitten that day before they reached the farm house of some relatives who put them up for the night.
 
To me, that experience of my parents, Ben and Mary, brings the reality of the first Christmas a little closer home, a story of a Joseph and Mary who endure a journey of also about a week’s length. Except they have no team and wagon, and may have even been traveling on foot.
 
Christmas cards portray Mary as a mature, composed thirty-ish white woman with a halo around her head and riding a donkey. In reality, she may have been a frightened young teenager, forced to go on a grueling journey in her last month of pregnancy, and then having to have her first child born in a less than welcoming place.
 
Such is the drama of Christmas, a story of poor and ordinary people with whom God journeys in extraordinary ways.                     (December 7, 2010)

On The Third Day Of Christmas--Another Favorite Post From Christmas Past

The Startling Story of the Stolen Stihl

I gave myself the gift of a brand new chain saw back in 2009, a smooth running Stihl 250. Until then I had always gotten by with used ones for cutting our annual supply of firewood, first a faithful old Homelite and later a secondhand Stihl named “Farm Boss.”  When that one finally breathed its last, I heeded the advice of family members who urged me to get a new one.

Some months later, just before Christmas, we had one of the heaviest snow storms ever. Soon thereafter, on a cold day while I was at work, a friendly stranger came to our door and asked my wife if he could shovel out our lower drive--for a modest fee. Among other things, he explained, he had just been awarded visitation of his ten-year-old son and needed some extra cash to buy him some things for Christmas.

While my kindhearted spouse had never met the man before, he seemed pleasant enough, and we did need more parking space cleared for holiday guests. So why not have him remove the snow, she thought, to surprise me and to do a needy person a favor?

“Just return the shovel to the utility room when you’re finished,” she said, “and I’ll have your money waiting for you there in an envelope.”

Meanwhile, she went about her work and only occasionally checked to see how he was doing. A phone call she received near the time he was finishing prevented her from actually seeing him leave, but when she checked everything out, she found the lower driveway clean, our shovel back in its place and the payment gone, so she felt satisfied that all was well. She also excused herself for the extra generous payment she had left for him. After all, it was Christmas.

When I came home that evening and learned about my wife's surprise move, I assured her it was fine. Whether or not his story was entirely true, I figured, it's always better to err on the side of generosity.

It was not until the next morning that I discovered my new chain saw, stored in the aforementioned utility room and with the word "stihl" emblazoned on it in bold letters, was missing. Just plain gone, nowhere to be found.

My wife was devastated, in spite of my assurances that a chain saw was quite replaceable, and that she needn’t be hard on herself. I also promised I would report the missing saw in case it showed up in a pawn shop somewhere and could be recovered. “Maybe I just loved my new toy a little too much,” I joked.

Much to our surprise, the sheriff’s deputy assigned to the case showed up with the stolen Stihl the very next day, Christmas Eve Day. “Here’s your saw,” he said, “Merry Christmas. And just to let you know, the gentleman who took it will be spending his holiday in jail.” Which seemed fair enough, though we couldn't help feeling sorry for anyone having to be behind bars at this special time of the year.

But the story doesn’t end there. Over the next year we had a series of conversations and an exchange of letters with our unexpected friend. We learned he had earned the position of “trusty” in his jail pod and was scheduled to be released December 24, 2010, exactly a year after being locked up for stealing my Stihl.

In one of his letters he wrote, “Yes, it's a blessing to be leaving here on Christmas Eve. It makes me feel special to know God has plans for me.”

Among those plans was to spend his first months of freedom at Gemeinschaft Home, a local recovery and re-entry program for ex-offenders, subject to our being able to raise at least $500 toward his first month's stay.

Our new friend, along with so many others who have ever been incarcerated, faced the doubly daunting task of finding a job, a decent place to live and the kind of treatment and support network people need to remain free of their addictions.

I say, "God, please bless them every one."                      (December 9, 2010)

Update: After several failed attempts at overcoming his addiction, including facing a later charge and twice being at Gemeinschaft Home, our friend is today holding down a job and appears to be doing well.

P. S. As a strong believer in the mission of Gemeinschaft Home, I urge you to support its 2020 Vision Campaign by sending a generous check to Gemeinschaft Home, P.O. Box 288, Harrisonburg, VA 22803. Or you can contribute online at http://www.gemeinschafthome.com to help recovering people get a new start.

Thanks for your help!

On The Second Day Of Christmas--A Favorite Post From Christmas Past

This is one of Darrell's pencil drawings.

This is one of my earliest posts, published nine years ago.

Darrell Price And The Peanut Brittle Project

I’ll always remember Christmas, 2010, as the year of the peanut brittle project. 

My older sister Fannie Mae had always made some of this delicacy every year for friends and members of her family, following the same hand-written recipe our Amish mother had always used. But in the fall of 2010, my sister learned she had an aggressive form of breast cancer, resulting in her having a mastectomy which, while successful and with encouraging results, left her unable to make our usual holiday treat. 

About this same time, some of us on the board of Gemeinschaft Home, a residential recovery and re-entry program for ex-offenders, were looking at some possible enterprises that would help provide some work for unemployed or underemployed residents, always a challenge for persons with prison records. 

So with candy on my mind, I began to think, what if we could have a resident or two at Gemeinschaft make some peanut brittle? Initially it was an idea my sister dismissed as unwise, given how difficult it is to make the product come out just right, like our own mother would make it. But when I mentioned this to the program director I was immediately encouraged to talk with Darrell Price, an experienced cook who was currently in search of work.

It turned out that Darrell, also an accomplished artist, was willing to give it a try. After several failed attempts, he finally got the tricky process of peanut brittle manufacturing down to a science, and with some advertising over some of my email address lists--along with some word of mouth promotion--he was able to produce and market a total of 45 pounds of what we labeled “Fannie Mae Yoder's Peanut Brittle” (not to be confused with the Fanny May candy brand), packaged in half-pound Ziploc bags. Within a ten day period of time, he had made and sold a total of $270 worth, with an overhead of of just under $50. 

It felt good, even to my sister, to see a project succeed that added a little extra holiday blessing to people, including myself, who got to sample some of the product from time to time.

Strictly for purposes of quality control, of course.😏   (December 23, 2010)

Update: Sadly, my dear sister passed away on October 21, 2019. 
https://harvyoder.blogspot.com/2019/10/one-of-my-favorite-heroes-just-passed.html

P. S. As a strong supporter in the mission of Gemeinschaft Home, I urge you to contribute to its 2020 Vision Campaign by sending a generous check to Gemeinschaft Home, P.O. Box 288, Harrisonburg, VA 22803. Or give online at http://www.gemeinschafthome.com to help recovering people get a new start.

Thanks for your help! 

**********************************************

When the song of the angels is stilled

When the star in the sky is gone

When the kings and princes are home

When the shepherds are back with their flocks

The work of Christmas begins;

To find the lost,

To heal the broken

To feed the hungry

To release the prisoner

To rebuild the nations

To bring peace among people everywhere.

-author unknown

On The First Day Of Christmas: Reflecting On A Year Of Unexpected Stress And Amazing Grace

This is still our favorite carol, sung here by the Indianapolis
Children's Choir and Youth Chorale.

This has been an eventful year for our family, with our 55th wedding anniversary in August, the death of my sister Fannie Mae in October, and my first ever series of major health issues this summer and fall.

Having planned to join a long prayer walk to promote giving for refugee relief, I had a checkup with my doctor in June to make sure it was OK for me to do this.

Everything checked out well, but while there I asked about a little nodule I'd been noticing next to my left ear. "Likely just a little cyst," he said, and agreed we should keep an eye on it but didn't think it was anything to worry about. More on that later.

Then in the weeks that followed I began to notice some unusual shortness of breath on my daily mile-long daily walks, so when I was at our local hospital with Alma Jean for one of her checkups, I made an appointment with a cardiologist. She in turn arranged for a stress test that revealed that something wasn't right, and a subsequent heart catheterization and echogram showed that one of my main descending arteries was totally blocked and another 70% blocked.

So very soon thereafter, on July 5, I had the first major (five hour) surgery of my life at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville for a double heart bypass. But after only four days I was in full recovery mode, blessed with the good care of Alma Jean and some nurses who made regular visits to make sure I was doing OK.

The support of my great wife, our daughter and sons, and our house church family and other friends and colleagues during and after the surgery was a blessing beyond belief. Ironically, at the time I remember telling numerous people how thankful I was that with my heart problem there was clear and specific way to have it repaired, and that, unlike if I had a diagnosis like cancer, once treated it was over. Fixed. Done.

Little did I realize that all the while I actually did have a malignant tumor in my left parotid gland. It was my dermatologist who urged me to see my ENT specialist to have it checked out. A biopsy showed it to be benign, but when my surgeon removed it on November 21 it proved to be malignant after all. In the process, he also took out seven lymph nodes, four of which also harbored cancer cells.

So beginning January 9 I'm to have 5-6 weeks of radiation treatments just to make sure the cancer hasn't (or won't) spread elsewhere.

I'm blessed to be back at work half-time at the Family Life Resource Center as before, but with a very slight speech impairment due to some nerves to my mouth and tongue having been affected by the surgery. This will hopefully get better over time.

Brad, our oldest, continues to write and perform his music in Pittsburgh and elsewhere, along with tutoring a number of students in math and other subjects and helping with music at the Pittsburgh Mennonite Church. Brent is really liking his second year of work with Beck Builders, a local solar and general contractor and a member of his congregation, and daughter-in-law Heidi is busy doing beautiful drapes for local homes and institutions. Joanna has moved her family of three children into a home she purchased in Pittsford, a suburb of Rochester, NY, and just became a fully certified art teacher. And all six of our "well above average"(!) grandchildren, ranging in age from 8 to 14, are doing amazingly well. 😊

In all we're experiencing tons of gratitude for all of the faith, hope and love we've experienced from all the good people we're blessed to have in our lives, especially our family and members of the house church family we've been a part of for three decades. But next to our Great Physician and Good Shepherd, I've found in Alma Jean my greatest friend and best caretaker imaginable, a priceless gift of amazing grace.

Glory to God in the highest, and peace on earth among everyone of goodwill!