Tis The Season

If this keeps up we will surely be having a white Christmas in the North Woods. It has been snowing pretty steadily the past few days. Not a big dumping but it just keeps coming in little increments. So far I think we have around 3 inches on the ground. I don’t know if it’s just me or what, but it seems like a lot of folks are in the Holiday mood this year. Decorations and lights are out in full force and it seems like every station I tune into on the radio has some holiday song playing. I’m enjoying it really despite all the commercialism that has hijacked Christmas. Gasp! Yes. I said it. I said the C-word. And I’m not ashamed of it either. When people on the street tell me “Happy Holidays” I usually come back with “Merry Christmas” and then watch their reaction.

How did it ever happen in this country that saying the word Christmas puts everyone on edge? What’s wrong with saying Christmas anyway? That is the name of the holiday isn’t it? Why is it that nobody has any qualms about saying the name of any other holiday? There is not a single holiday other than Christmas that people X- out part of the word for crying out loud! As I was growing up I always wondered what was up with that when I ‘d see “X-mas“. I thought it was some fancy way of saying Christmas like maybe the X was like a roman numeral or something. Like maybe it was Greek or some other ancient language for the word Christ. But, no it was just the beginnings of the relatively new phenomenon of “political correctness”. We mustn’t offend, you know.

It turns out that the big problem with Christmas isn’t the fact that people put up decorations or buy gifts for each other or drink eggnog or tell their kids that a fat guy named Santa supernaturally comes down their chimney with presents. No that’s not it at all. The big problem with Christmas is C-h-r-i-s-t. Yep, that’s it. People are offend by Christ. Always have been. And until he returns, always will be. It seems we are living at a time when a window of opportunity is just about to close. For most of us here in this country saying Merry Christmas was a perfectly acceptable thing to say during the time Christians have chosen to celebrate Jesus’ birth. Now, I’m not going to go into the whole thing about the pagan roots of how we got to this point but my point is, speaking the name of Christ has been a widely excepted thing to do in America and for a long, long time. But if everyone just blithely goes along with this notion that we can’t even speak the name of Christ in public the freedom of openly being a Christian in this country will soon come to a close.

In our prosperity I think we have taken for granted our freedom’s. We’re too comfortable in this country. We don’t want to make people feel uncomfortable so we say Happy Holidays instead. How tragic that we in America would deny our Lord for the sake of a little comfort. Christians living in Muslim countries would wish that, that is all that would happen if they openly spoke the name of Christ.

I’ve been thinking about how things have changed in America, about how Christianity keeps coming under fire. I know a lot of folks are just as saddened by it as I am and are wondering how we even got to this point. But, really during the 2 thousand plus years that Christianity has been in existence the freedom of openly being a real Christian without the fear of retribution has been a rare thing indeed. The freedoms that Christian Americans have enjoyed these past couple hundred years have been a window of opportunity to spread the gospel of Christ to the four corners of the earth. If we just keep going along with the current trend that window is sure to close. So why not help keep it open a little while longer. Next time someone says happy holidays come right back with a hearty Merry Christmas. Show them that you aren’t afraid to speak the name of Christ.

Last weekend the family and I went to see the new Nativity movie. I thought it was very well done. Going into it I was cringing a little bit wondering how badly they would chop up the scriptures. As far as I noticed there was just a few minor things that weren’t right but, overall it seemed to keep up with the facts pretty accurately. Gave you a sense of what it might have really been like back at the time of Jesus’ birth. It’s a weird time we are living in. It is a time when God is being outlawed in the public arena but yet at the same time Hollywood has learned there is money to be made by tailoring movies to the Christian market. With the technology they have for making movies with all the great special effects I wish they would make a lot more bible movies. As long as they stayed true to the Word. How about a new version of the Exodus story? I can just imagine how realistic they could make the parting of the Red Sea.
Anyway I highly recommend the movie and also I would urge everyone to speak up and tell folks to have a Merry Christmas during this coming “holiday” season.

Until Next Time