On The Twelfth Day of Christmas
Today is the twelfth and last day of Christmas. So, for all of us who decided to leave our Christmas decorations up until Epiphany (which starts tomorrow), light those lights, enjoy the decorations and the tree one last day. According to medieval tradition, all decor should be removed on the Twelfth Night of Christmas so as not bring bad luck upon the household. It's a good thing I don't believe in medieval tradition because I won't be getting to my decorations until this weekend. For centuries, the Twelfth Day of Christmas was a time of revelry, a day when the social order was turned upside down. Masters dressed as servants, servants as masters. The essential meaning behind the topsy-turvy celebrations on the Twelfth Day of Christmas was that through Jesus, God had taken on the form of a servant, and come to live among us---or "moved into our neighborhood," as Eugene Peterson put it in The Message. My New Testament reading for th...