I love the Christmas season. I love the lights, the Christmas trees, the nativity scenes and the beautiful Christmas hymns glorifying Jesus that you sometimes hear even at Walmart.
But this past week I talked with a Christian brother who informed me that he and his church do not celebrate Christmas. The reason he gave was that Dec. 25 was originally an ancient pagan holiday.
I consider this a lame excuse and one that does not recognize the redeeming power of our Lord. Does not Jesus take poor hell-bound sinners, redeem their lives and make them His witnesses and instruments of his grace? Can He not do the same with a pagan holiday?
Indeed, when church officials at the end of the third century settled on Dec. 25 as the date to celebrate Christ’s birth (the exact day is not known), they probably chose that date to confront and redeem pagan holidays that on that day honored Saturn, the Roman god of agriculture, and Mithra, the Persian god of light.
I have a Gibson Dove guitar that was bought by a friend in a yard sale. It was a pitiful sight with a broken neck and strings broken and twisted. Who knows? Maybe it was owned by a drug-infested, hard rock group and got broken in a barroom brawl.
It doesn’t matter! That guitar is now restored, redeemed and used for the honor and glory of God. Its past has no bearing on its present. Any curse has been swallowed up in God’s redemptive grace.
In the same way, it really doesn’t matter what some pagans did with Dec. 25 centuries ago. What matters is what we as Christians do with Dec. 25 today.
A greater threat to Christmas is the modern secularization of the holiday that seeks to eliminate the word “Christmas” altogether and make it the “Winter Holiday.” Anti-Christian forces are seeking to empty Dec. 25 of all religious content, including the birth of Christ, and transform it into a godless, secular holiday.
Early Christians redeemed Dec. 25 from paganism, and we must redeem it from this modern, woke secularist culture. We do this by making our voices heard, and in all kinds of creative ways reminding this world that Christmas represents the entry of God into this world to redeem fallen humanity.
Charles Wesley did this in his magnificent hymn, “Hark the Herald Angels Sing,” which he was inspired to write by the sound of London church bells while walking to church one Christmas day. He wrote,
Hark the herald angels sing/ Glory to the newborn king.
Peace on earth and mercy mild/ God and sinners reconciled.
Joyful all ye nations rise/ Join the triumph of the skies.
With angelic hosts proclaim/ Christ is born in Bethlehem. {eoa}
Dr. Eddie Hyatt is an author and ordained minister with over 50 years of ministerial service as a pastor, teacher, revivalist and professor of theology. His books are available from Amazon and his website at eddiehyatt.com.
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