With Christmas just a few days away, I'm excited to share an excerpt from my latest book, Cradle and Cross, which is now available on Amazon.com and by order at your local book store.
Does caroling fit into your holiday plans? Here's how it went in our family.
Caroling We Will Go!
O come let us adore Him, Christ the Lord!
-
King John IV of Portugal
“Let’s go caroling!
We’ve never been caroling. We
should go caroling!”
The
words came from our littlest grand, Nathaniel.
He was 7. He had looked up from
his plate as he finished his Christmas dinner and blurted out his thought. My daughters, his sister and I were all still
sitting at the table, relaxing in that lull between a huge meal and dealing
with the kitchen. We stared at each
other. Where in the world had this idea
come from? We had never talked about
caroling. What did he know about
caroling?
As
is his practice, he kept on…with determination.
“Come on…we need to go caroling down the street. It’ll be fun.” And we could think of no reason why not. We live at the end of a short street with
little traffic…a nice setting for a happy activity. Becky called her friend who came right over
with her children and a group of ten of us headed out. Left that kitchen in total disarray and went
caroling.
As
we made our way from house to house, I teared up at the reception from our
neighbors. Several came to the front of
their homes when they heard our voices, opened doors and windows and came out
to greet us with big smiles. It was a
first for my small neighborhood.
What
makes this story even more special is that Nathaniel is deaf. He has two cochlear implants which enable him
to hear and we are so thankful for that.
At the time of this story, he had just received his first implant after
wearing a hearing aid for two years. And
he was bugging the doctors to give him his second cochlear. He got the second implant a month later. When his mother became emotional before the
first implant surgery, his reply was simply, “Mommy, I just want to hear.”
And
so he marched happily down the street that night, with a smile that would light
up Times Square, singing Christmas carols for my neighbors.
We came to
adore Him…Christ the Lord.