Rockwall, TX (December 15, 2025) – During the holidaze, I’ve a habit of posting my Christmas decor on social media with long descriptive captions. It’s fun for me to find my memories flowing through descriptions of ornaments, centerpiece arrangements, Christmas tree placement. We’ve a lot of memories swirling around Christmastime, don’t we?
Not all the memories are good for all of us. For me it’s a mix. Childhood memories of the agony of the Christmas Eve program at church remain. Sometime in November, we would begin weekly Saturday rehearsals. Memory work was assigned, according to our age and grade in Sunday School. It was up to us to know those bible verses and speak them to the congregation on Christmas Eve. The hymns we practiced were never tough for me. I already knew most of them. I loved singing and loved singing in church and in choir. Still do, though it’s been several years since I’ve participated in a choir.
Those long Saturday mornings spent in the sanctuary were drudgery. Rehearsing the drill of up and down from pews to the altar steps, lining up in correct formation; listening to allllll the kids recite was agonizing for us. I did it. Always knew my verses. Always knew the hymns. Always sat with good behavior. I was that child – an obedient pleaser.
Christmas Eve was spent in a state of anxious anticipation. I knew my lines. I knew where to be. But getting up in front of a church filled to standing room in the back was my most dreaded couple of hours of the year. Unlike my granddaughter, I was not meant to be a performer nor a public speaker. I would tremble and as we got closer to time to leave for that evening program, my tummy would tie in knots.
Mom always allowed one gift to be opened before we left for the evening program. It was often something to wear to church, new mittens, a new hat – some variation for all of us. I remember one Michigan Christmas Eve, there were four velvet hats. Mine a deep gold in color, of almost an elfin shape. A cute pouf of white bunny fur on the tippy top and velvet ties for a bow under my chin. I felt snappy in that hat, with my shiny white-blonde hair curling out beneath. Side note: I did not have curly hair as a child. Mine was shiny, fine in texture, and silky. Those curls were created with uncomfortable wire rollers covered in prickles, and a plastic pink pin piercing the middle to secure the torturous cylinder to our head. We slept in them.
Hats on, coats on, mittens donned. Off we’d go to church. My parents were unrelenting about allowing absence from Christmas Eve program. There was no acting sick. The only thing that would keep us home was raging fever or active vomiting. I did not enjoy the program, nor did I enjoy vomiting.
My nerves would continue to shriek, and eventually we’d arrive, each heading to our Sunday school room. The next hours were a blur for me. We would line up and proceed, single file through the hallways to the narthex, entering the front pews from either side of the church. Up and down the steps of the altar area, we would go in formation for singing and reciting. As we grew older, kids like us were given multiple, more obscure verses for recitation. Our row had to agonize through all the grades before us – the older we grew, the longer the wait until our time. How I longed for a Sunday School program with kids playing out the Christmas story as a play, in costume! This was never a performance, but an offering; the story and the glory lifted up and shared.
As the program inched closer and closer to my individual recitations, nervousness became intense, when my time came, I would recite – my face burning red in the flush that betrays emotion for fair blonde kids. I’d speak with a shaking voice, but it was decreed I would speak loud and clear, and so I would. Eyes wandering, disciplining the tears to remain unshed, always there was a familiar adult smiling and making eye contact, affirming my effort with a nod of their head (all the adults liked me – I was a pleaser, and I suppose an appealing kid.) That would be the thing to get me to the end of my parts. When I had finished the last of my solo recitations, relief would come, the heat would begin to leave my cheeks, and my anxious tension begin to seep away.
The tale would continue, now nearing the easy part, leading to conclusion. Once more a whole congregation of Sunday School kids would rise from the front pews, and in single file ascend the steps to stand in formation. Then the recitation of Luke 2, verses 1-20. The Christmas Story. In unison. We were in the home stretch and these twenty verses were as familiar to me as Away In A Manger, the simple hymn sung each year from Kindergarten up (until we were the older kids singing descant.) We would recite the story, and my eyes would fill with tears and emotion would nearly overcome. Even now, when I read aloud or recite those verses aloud, tears roll down my cheeks. I am moved with so many emotions springing from those verses.
As a child and still today, when Linus recites Luke 2, I weep.
We were done! A massive sigh of relief reverberated through the entire Sunday School. But still, we had to maintain decorum and return to the pew, to await the Benediction. “The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.” I am not a scholar of religion or spiritual life, so forgive me if I err. This blessing, in some form or another, seems universal to me. Beliefs of Hindu, Islamic, Buddhist, Jewish, Deist, Christian, Spiritualist, conservative, progressive or liberal, and all others. Surely a blessing of light and grace and a higher power granting peace – is universal. Simply – Peace be with you.
And then, after benediction, we returned to our classrooms to accept a traditional brown bag gift of nuts, an orange and an apple, a bit of Christmas candy and a book. Modest and though some kids tossed them aside, I loved that gift. Someone kept track to ensure we never received a book we’d been given in previous years.
Relief and joy! Home to Christmas Eve snacks and the opening of family gifts!
The B.O.B. noted the other day that we needed to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas. I think tonight will be our night.
Peace be with you.
By contributing writer Sally Kilgore. Find more of her “Kukka” columns at BlueRibbonNews.com. Sally is married to her long-time flame, Judge Chris Kilgore. Sally’s work is published in The Dallas Morning News, Blue Ribbon News, Persimmon Tree, and Orchards Poetry. Sally writes a blog on her website, SallyAKilgore.com. Contact her by email via her website.
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