I have had more than one person tell me that he prefers Thanksgiving to Christmas; both are very great family times, but Thanksgiving comes without all of the hassles. Could we stand back from both of these holidays for just a moment in order to see them for what they are? At Thanksgiving we gather together, primarily as families, simply to express our gratitude to God for our wonderful provisions. Period. That’s it.
At Christmas, we celebrate the birth of Christ, giving thanks to God the Father for sending His son to wipe our slates clean of all of our sins, so we are no longer burdened by them. Like Thanksgiving, that’s it. Simple. However, we have made it into so much more than that, which could be good, except we have lost the true focus, in great measure. So now it is a lot of good things, but it is not THE thing that it stands for; THE thing has been lost in all of the activity.
Might we be able to increase our joy in Christmas if we spend less time in all the activity and more time on the true focus? I don’t mean that we should spend a lot less time on the activity, just enough less to create the foundation that our minds require, so we have our bearings.
Maybe just this moment thinking about it will help us to work in that direction. Let’s see. First, we ask ourselves the fundamental question: do we really believe that God exists? For most of us, that is pretty easy, seeing creation as too complex to have created itself. From there, does He care about us? That is pretty simple too. If we were God would we create a being as complex and wonderful as a person, and not cherish it? It follows that He would care about us as we care about our children – can’t explain it; we just do.
Since He did not want robots, he gave us totally free will, capable of love, but also atrocities. We look around, and we see both. Now, what does He do? He sends His Son to pay the ultimate penalty for whatever we have done. It is a free gift, but there is one stipulation: we have to desire to get to know Him, desire it enough to seek Him with our whole heart. When we accept His payment on our behalf on His terms, our life starts over, now and for eternity.
So that is it. If we come to the point that we are feeling overwhelmed by the Christmas season, let’s take the time to regain our bearings: Lord help me. Every time I’ve asked, He has.
Merry Christmas,
Art Hall
