Christmas

Macy's Department Store helped immortalize the 1947 Christmas movie classic, "Miracle on 34^th Street." This Christmas they banned that memory and even prohibited their clerks from telling any customer "Merry Christmas" in all 450 stores. They will profit tens of millions of dollars in sales, but it will only be on the politically correct "Season's Greetings" or "Happy Holidays."[1]

Preachers and priests will cry from their pulpits to "put Christ back into Christmas," but growing numbers of Americans are saying "No" because it might offend someone.

• A first-grade teacher in Sacramento Co., Calif., says her principal has prohibited instructors from uttering the word "Christmas" in class or in written materials

• A school superintendent in Yonkers, N.Y., banned holiday decorations that contained religious themes more than the generic "season's greetings;"

• New York City schools are being sued for alleged discrimination against Christians over Christmas.

• And atheists reposted their vandalized winter solstice sign in the Wisconsin Capital, as they declare "Christians stole Christmas" from ancient pagans.[2]

Complicating this is the growing block of Americans who say that they are unaware of any association between Christmas and Jesus Christ (10% of the populace). A growing movement among atheists is to "re-paganize" Christmastime.[3]

While the Christmas "tradition" is being bruised and stomped on, another group of Christians are reminding us of the pagan background of Christmas and citing Jeremiah 10:2-4 – "Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the ax. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not."

It is true that Jesus was likely born in the fall at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles (the time period, incidentally, He will come the second time). December 25 has been artificially set. Some Christians are going as far as to say it is a "sin" to celebrate Christmas. December 25, 2004, has become the most controversial Christmas in U.S. history.

In the throes of World War II (1942) British Prime Minister Winston Churchill came to Washington to join President Franklin Roosevelt in the lighting of the National Christmas Tree (a tradition started by Calvin Coolidge in 1923). Thousands of citizens were there.

"Let the children have their night of fun and laughter, proclaimed Churchill. Let the gifts of Father Christmas delight their play. Let us grown-ups share to the full in their unstinted pleasures before we turn again to the stern task and formidable years that lie before us, resolved that, by our sacrifice and daring, these same children shall not be robbed of their inheritance or denied the right to live in a free and decent world."

For millions of people, that tree with the season called Christmas is a time of festivity for family and friends. To millions the celebration also points to the birth of Jesus. The story of the manger, baby Jesus and Emmanuel are among the most beloved and majestic reminders of who we really are.

We can become politically correct and use the season to criticize its adherents or even steal the wonders of redemption out of His birth. If we can balance the secularism with the gospel, what a great way to complement the celebration of Christmas. Christmas is a national holiday and part of the American tradition. We can use it as a hammer to destroy or a tool to build. I'd rather be part of the latter.

Christmas is a way of colloquially saying, "Happy Birthday, Jesus" or maybe even "Thank you, Jesus, for that Birthday." When is the last time you told Him "Thank you for being born"? That was a physical, spiritual and mental "feat." Only eternity will bring to us clues as to the humiliation and condescension that that Christmas Story actually meant to the courts of heaven and the eternal benefit it was to mankind.

This country is having enough problems with the legal eradication of the Lord's Prayer from school and "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. For Christians and secularists to ban Christmas at a season when part of the gospel can be legally legitimized is wasting an opportunity.

Sexes have become publicly unisex. Profiling the honorably distinctiveness of the races has become a hate crime. Tolerating sinfulness is even touted by churches today to be sensitive to others. This spirit has led often to greater sympathy for the perpetrator of wrong than the victim. Society and its enduring values have been turned inside out.

If Christmas is removed from this national season, so will Christ. When Christ goes, all that He stands for does also. What only do we have left? –  What sociologists and politicians may say. The country becomes more and more like a great commune after man's order. And that is the greater curse.

Christmas is a beautiful time for family and friends. It is also an opportunity for personal ministries. Instead of X-mas, make it Christ-mas. Mark Twain said, "Tell the truth, it will amaze your friends and confound your enemies." Secularists need to be astounded by how exciting Jesus can be to us!

                              
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