I don’t know about you, but Christmas is a struggle for me. I want it to be about Christ and Christ alone. Yet there are so many things pulling us away from that. There are so many considerations and accommodations that almost seem necessary. What does eating turkey with family have to do with the birth of Christ? We might say it is a celebration, but really? How much time does the family spend bringing glory to God and verbally and demonstrably celebrating the birth of Christ? I mean, not counting the pre-meal prayer?
First we have a high degree of certainty that Christ was not born on December 25th. Ultimately that particular day has little historical value from a Christian perspective; Christ was likely born in the spring or summer. Many of the symbols of Christmas are from pagan religious observations/celebrations and should probably not be used, such as the Christmas tree & other Christmas decorations.
Gift giving becomes a distraction from the real meaning of Christmas, so we try to eliminate gifts as a part of our celebration, postponing them to some time around the New Year if they are to be received at all.
The difficult part comes in where and how to celebrate Christmas. Our families are rooted in Houston but this is the only time we have to see many of them each year as some come into town. Can we really completely seclude ourselves in our own home to celebrate Christ’s birth in a meaningful way and thereby diminish familial relationships? While it would be ideal to completely replace our pagan celebrations with Christ-centered worship, the cost seems significant and one has to ask if there's a better way.
I think I’ve decided how our family will approach it from now on, Lord willing. We will celebrate Christmas on December 24th. We will have a day of worship to God and thanksgiving for Christ’s birth. I will preach about his coming, death & resurrection. We will sing Christ centered Christmas songs. We will pray prayers of thanksgiving and praise. We may watch a Christ-centered Christmas story movie, and it may not be very entertaining to our flesh, but hopefully it will build up our souls. We will eat turkey and other traditional holiday food. We will have a birthday cake for Jesus and sing happy birthday to Him.
We will NOT play dominoes, watch sports, watch secular TV or find any other time fillers to focus on other than Christ. We will worship our God for sending His son to save our souls. To this worship service in our homes we will invite our family, focusing on those who have a relationship with Christ, because this time is meant to be a time of worship, not a time of evangelism.
Then on December 25th we’ll make the traditional rounds of turkey eating and visiting with family while re-emphasizing to our children that our prior day of worship is what Christmas is really all about.
