I really enjoy Christmas! I like to watch people interact so I find going to the store during big sales somewhat adventurous. I love picking out presents for friends and family members and see them get excited when they get something they like, and of course I enjoy getting presents. By far one of my favorite activities is trying to guess my presents wrapped in delicious looking candy cane wrapping paper. (There are many techniques you can use....shaking, feeling, smelling, and tasting to name a few).
As I have gotten older and grown in my relationship with God I have started to question the way Christmas is celebrated. As a Christian I celebrate Christmas because it is God sending his son, Jesus, to Earth so that he can live a perfect life and someday die for humanities sins. Ultimately, and it's a mind boggling idea that I still can't even grasp my mind around, it is God coming down to Earth in human form...or the fancy church word for it...the incarnation of Christ.
When I begin to wrap my mind around this I start to wonder where all these other Christmas traditions came from. Take giving and receiving presents for example....where did that come from? Now I know that the holiday of Christmas itself has it's origins in Roman mythology and the church introduced it as Christ's birthday so Christians would have something to celebrate that wasn't pagan. From what I understand the giving of Christmas presents was actually suppressed by the Roman Catholic Church during the middle ages because of it's pagan roots (I read that on Wikipedia, so it could be false).
The main point I am trying to make is regardless of how Christmas originated and got connected with Jesus' birth is irrelevant. The important thing is that this is the holiday that we choose to celebrate God coming to Earth. How do we choose to celebrate it though? Most of us say, myself included, yeah this is Jesus' birthday...yay Jesus! But then we go off to to the store and charge our credit cards and spend hundreds of dollars on presents, and fall into a consumer oriented Christmas instead of a Christ oriented Christmas.
What would happen if our gift buying reflected our relationship with God? Would we buy the same gifts that we have already bought, or plan to buy for you last minute people, or would we buy gifts that not only gave to one person but also helped other people out as well? What if we bought gifts for people so they could use those gifts to serve God and bring him glory? What if before we woke up and tore into our presents we set time aside first to worship God for what he has blessed with us? What if we went against culture, and didn't get caught up with the consumer minded antics, and created a Christ-centered culture that worshiped God fully this Christmas season?
Tonight I will go home and turn on my Christmas tree, turn the lights on that wrap my porch, and then head off to a Christmas party. As I continue to ponder over the idea of Christmas and what Immanuel (Christ with us) means to my family, my ministry, and myself and what response of worship can truly be worthy of a God that came down to me...it can only result in my whole life going to Him.
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