It’s just a few more days to that celebration of the Birth of Christ… Just a few days more…
Although we know that Jesus was not born on December 25th, it is at least a day that we can enjoy the celebration of Emmanuel – “God with us…”
In this world of instant global communication, something that happens in a remote corner of the world can be immediately seen by another corner of the world. I have personally enjoyed some videos of pets, kids, weddings, gaffs and jokes. Through social media (Facebook) and singing like a bird (Twitter) and the fairly new standby and less used email, we are often sharing events as quickly as they occur. I often wonder why I still walk to the end of the driveway to pick up snail mail on a daily basis! With telephones that now slip into a watch pocket we are not only able to voice around the globe, we are using these small devices to socialize, window shop, purchase, mail, print and basically be mobile in an unprecedented way.
Someone posted recently that they are so busy it seems like there really is no Christmas season. Others have yet to “buy” a single gift. If you are like me, you haven’t put out a single Christmas “decoration…”
Imagine what it was like 2,000 years ago.
There was no world wide communication system. What happened in some remote corner of the world might not be known for years. Around the world, people were ignorant of the story of Mary. Perhaps as high as 99.999% of the world knew nothing, and would continue to know nothing about the advent for decades. Where joy was being celebrated, the world was still experiencing life as they had always known it. On this day of celebration, take note that there were many other children born – and we do not know who they are. On this day of celebration around the world many others sickened and died. Around the world people were needing a physician, others were going broke, someone laughed, and someone cried.
For many, Christmas is just another day, albeit one away from the job, and even perhaps hanging out with family. There is no true celebration of the Advent – no longer is there a stable, a manger, a new mom, nor even a baby crying. What happened those centuries ago were not recorded by some HD video, nor digital camera, nor by some blogger.
Christmas is seemingly all about the tree and gifts.
The toy drives are geared to make sure every child has some gift to unwrap on Christmas morning. Garbage pickup will take away the remnants of this day and dump them into some hole in the ground. Vacant tree lots will soon be stuffing those unsold trees into a chipper to make mulch. Trees that were sold will soon start showing up on the side of road where lazy people dump them. Children will soon grow tired of the gifts. Adults will gaze at the detritus left behind and quickly begin to put away the decorations where they will collect dust for another year.
I have nothing against the celebration of Christmas by putting up a tree, decorating the house, exchanging gifts and spending time with friends and family.
Think about this.
The true celebration of a Christian life is less about December 25th, or Passover (Easter), or Burial, or even the Ascension… It should be more about the birth of the church, and we do not celebrate Pentecost as jubilantly. At a personal level, we seldom celebrate our natural births as elaborately as Christmas, and many cannot even remember the date that they were re-born.
If you are a re-born Child of God, let this Christmas season be re-born in you and celebrate your spiritual birth along with the Birth of Christ!