Chri'mas Eve

We went to the Christmas Eve service at my parents' church this evening, my brother, my mother and I. My father was away on general call this evening. The day after Christmas, he's on OB call, and then again on New Years Eve, when delighted parents will be welcoming their little last-minute tax deductions. He loves babies, and so though it usually means being up for 24 hours straight, he prefers OB call to the other kinds.

The service was pretty good. I love Christmas hymns, which I think shouldn't be relegated just to Christmas (why can't we sing Silent Night in July, I want to know?), and I love singing. I just wish I knew the carols' alto parts. When I learned them, I was a soprano. Now I'm an alto, and some of the high parts are murderous. "Noel, Noel, Born is the King of Israel" nearly kills me every time, and especially when the hymn was started a bit high.

The only drawback of the service was the decision to hand out wax candles to the children as they came in. At the end of the service, as we sang the last two songs, all the candles were lighted. Little children who had been poking their siblings throughout the entire sermon were suddenly entrusted with fire. In the end, nobody had torched themselves or anybody else, but all the burning candles in little hands freaked me out--they'd turn around and miss their neighbor's ponytail by inches, or wave their taper in time to the music. Aack. And the pastor said the closing prayer while all the candles were still lit. My eyes stayed unreverently open and glued to the kid in front of me, who was industriously attempting to blow out his sister's candle, and not exactly trustworthy with his own.

Christ is Born, let His people rejoice!