Should Christians be pro or anti Christmas?

Image from NE Michigan Reformation Society

I’m speaking at City Bible Forum next Thursday – a one off talk on Christmas. Gives me a chance to work up something for the December Christmas talks here. But I’ve been doing what I do every November/December – having second thoughts about Christmas. It just seems so all consuming. Family, work, church – suddenly everything revolves around the Christmas season.

At a church level, most churches would have preaching programs and kids ministry that spends December each year doing Christmas. Plenty of evangelism is tied around it as well – from Gingerbread to Carols to Christmas Eve & Day services.

Why? Why make such a big deal of it? Yes, it is big in the culture and you can ‘trade off’ that. Yes, the kids love Christmas and its better that they hear about Jesus than Santa. Yes, we do have people that will only come on Christmas so they should hear about Jesus. Is this kind of thinking strategic and missional or is it just pragmatic.

The puritans tried (but largely failed) to ban Christmas. Andreas Kostenburger has a great article here on it where he asks this question:

how can Christians in one age seek to outlaw Christmas and in another champion the cause of celebrating Christmas?

Why didn’t Puritans like Christmas?

1. they couldn’t find it in the Bible & if you follow the regulative principle then why would you set it up?
2. there were those nasty associations with pagan midwinter festivals and Roman Catholic masses
3. it led to debauchery

I’m no believer in the regulative principle BUT Jesus never said ‘remember my birthday’. Instead he said remember my death – we even get a date for it! Surely something is out of whack when so much is made of his birth compared to his death. We of all people should be talking up Easter and making it a much bigger deal in our churches and families. Right?

Attempts to ban Christmas were seen as rather Scroogeish and led to riots and protests. But you have to admire the way they acted on their convictions.

So I don’t think we should ban Christmas. What will your family do though? and your church? Will you just get swept along by the season or will you do Christmas differently?

What if your local church had a sign up saying ‘Christmas cancelled this year – enjoy the day with your family and friends, join us next Sunday instead and hear about a Jesus worth worshipping every day of the year’

What do you reckon? What crazy reforms would you bring to Christmas?

 

Is Jesus worth stopping for at Christmas?

Ever walked past a busker without making eye contact?

What if you missed a brilliant musician slumming it?  Will one of the America’s greatest musicians be noticed in a D.C. Metro stop during rush hour? Violinist Joshua Bell experimented for Gene Weingarten’s Sunday Magazine story in The Washington Post.

Jesus got a similar reception in Bethlehem. God came to town and there was no room at the inn. 

Hope you can stop this Christmas and remember it is all about HIM. He really is worth stopping for. 

I’m going to play this clip at church on Christmas Eve 5pm.

 

The unexpected God

Georges Roualt 'Crucifixion'

 

The manger seems an unfitting place for God to be born. 

The cross seems an unfitting place for God to die.

 

The unwelcome God

There was no room for them at the inn. (Luke 2)

Is this just saying Bethlehem was full – they hadn’t booked ahead, nothing on lastminute.com so they got bumped to the stable…

or are we supposed to see a family being rejected in their family town? Middle Eastern friends have said the thought of not opening up their home for a family members would be shameful. Maybe the point is not that Mary & Joseph are late but that they are not welcome. That the Creator could come to his creatures and not be welcome – is that possible?

Thoughts?

 

Is Santa real?

No, Santa is not real. 

Jesus however is. 

The reason I mention that is that Google seems to have decided this is a good site to send people who want to know ‘Is Santa real?’ So if you’ve come here on that search let me also say this…

I’m preaching on Luke’s gospel at the moment and was struck again by the historical reliability of the Bible. Don’t believe what Dan Brown tells you. Ask the questions John Dickson does in Simply Christianity: where he compares the Bible with other ancient manuscipts:

First: How many copies of the early documents do we have?

• Homer 642 copies
• Sophocles 193 copies
• Plator 7 copies
• Caesar 10 copies
• New Testament 24, 000 copies

Second: What is the time between the writing of the original documents and the earliest copies we have? 

• Homer 500 years
• Sophocles 1400 years
• Plato 1200 years
• Caesar 1000 years
• New Testament 40-90 years

So we can have great confidence that was preserved in the Bible today is what was originally written. At Christmas we are dealing with a claim made by the first followers of Jesus that they had met God in the flesh! 

And they don’t mention Santa. Not even once.

 

Crucifying Santa

I dare you to put this up on your front lawn this Christmas!

Sinclair Ferguson is no fan of Santa. Read & see why. 

Our recently turned 6 year old told us last week he’s spending lunchtimes making a list of the kids who believe in Santa & then explaining to each of them that Santa isn’t real. We didn’t put him up to this but suspect telling him to stop will only encourage him more. We describe Santa as a game but try & put the focus on Jesus. 

I remember with great fondness telling my sister that Santa wasn’t real and that the presents actually came from Mum & Dad. She didn’t believe me so we stayed up on Christmas Eve till we could spy them placing the presents under the tree. 

Why would you want your kids to believe in Santa? I don’t know how many times I’ve heard parents threaten kids with Santa ‘If you’re not good then you know what happens’. While you’ve got to sympathise with parents trying anything on in the December madness of Westfield isn’t this too much for a kid to bear? Santa seems to me the pin up boy for conditional love. (Bah humbug – I’ve always thought blogs were for grumpy old men & here I am slagging off Santa!)

 

Essential (free) reading for 2009

I got my hands on The Essential Jesus today. Over a million of these will be given out to Sydneysiders in 2009 as part of the Connect 09 campaign. 

Its a fresh translation of Luke’s gospel with a helpful background on the Old Testament. After Luke’s account of Jesus, a summary of the message is presented using the Two Ways to Live framework, concepts and illustrations, but linking back to the content of Luke. You can see a free pdf here. 

What you can’t see online is just how good this gospel looks. Nice paper, quality cover, nothing to be embarressed about here. No dodgy headings, no verse markings, good font. Because the diocese has ordered over a million, they’ve been able to do a decent run and drop the unit price. So Koorong for instance is selling them for $1.95. How many of these can you give away at Christmas? 

At Barneys we’ve ordered 2000 copies. I think we’ll easily give them away and think we may need to order more. 

We should pray expectantly that God will change our city as his word goes out.