A Christmas Perspective - Keith Green

I've heard a lot of talk (especially by Christians) about the true meaning of Christmas. I've seen Christians go in for all the trappings and trimmings. They spend hours, even days, in department stores trying to figure out what to buy for friends and relatives who already have everything they need and then sitting around the tree and watching nervously while someone opens up the present you got them, as they try to look surprised and squeal with delight. Parents teaching their young what they call "a harmless fairy tale" - the story of Santa and how "he's gonna bring you lots of presents, so you better be good," and all the while, a world full of starving, deprived people are silently, invisibly looking in through your living room window begging for a scrap of food, a rag to keep them from shivering to death, and an answer to their misery, suffering, and oppression.

When we consider all the money spent by all of us, during a season that's greatest meaning is the Father giving us His only Son to come live and die for us, we must cry out against the injustice of an American, Christian people, who have so much and yet do so little. [b]The true meaning of this season should be to give ourselves to the work of spreading the Gospel[/b]. Proclaiming freedom to the captives! Giving them bread to eat, then pointing them to the Bread of Life, to fill their hungry souls.

As a part of your Christmas celebration this year, we suggest taking your children to a ghetto, to a hospital, to an orphanage, to an old-age home. Teach them the meaning of giving. Teach them it is foolish for us to spend money on things we don't need, and on things that others don't need. Let them spread joy to those who are miserable! Let them give a smile to an old woman's face, whose own children have forgotten and abandoned her in a convalescent hospital. Let them empty their piggy banks and send the money to missions and the poor. Let there be giving! Costly giving! Let us give our Lord Jesus the whole world for His birthday! The world and the Lord await our response.

- Keith Green

Amen, brother Steve.

Every Christmas we take our sons to a rescue mission and help serve dinner.

This is a wonderful thing, and I'm glad you're exposing your kids to the real meaning behind Christmas - [i]giving[/i]. Personally, I have no problem with putting a tree in my living room. It's very pretty and I love how my house smells like a Douglas fir. I like my fireplace crackling, as I sip hot cocoa and listen to Christmas hymns or a J.S. Bach cantata or oratorio playing softly in the backround. To tell you the truth, everyday is really like Christmas for me, every day is new and fresh and exciting and the efficacy of Jesus' blood is as sin-destroying and all-conquering as ever. God's mercies are new each morning, and His compassions fail not. So, really, every morning waking up early to get into the Word of God and discovering fresh waves of goodness and promises is like the joy of approaching a perpetual Christmas tree.

Look guys, anyone can become a spurner of holidays and festivals; but such radical ascetism is actually the mark of a person devoid of grace and possessing zeal without knowledge. It's easy to hate Christmas after reading an article on Constantine and druids and paganistic equinox and solstice festivals and whatever else. To publically come against what we call Christmas today with both guns blazing is not the mark of a spiritual man; it's actually pretty shallow, banal, trite...and, if you ask me, unimpressive. It shows me where that person is, maturity-level wise, in the school of God.

So, don't take offense to the Christmas or Easter or anything-haters; just understand in your heart the true meaning God has laid out for us 24/7-365, and in all that you do, do it to the glory of God in Jesus Christ. This is how we keep our conscience clean and pure, and this is how we can be a channel of blessing to others no matter what the occasion...especially during Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Brother Paul