CHRISTMAS OR XMAS by Dave Brown

When we enter the Christmas season the stores are full of religious objects and the air is saturated with religious music. It is a very emotional time of year, filled with nostalgic childhood memories. It is a time of year that can bring out the best in people - the giving of gifts, the taking care of the poor, the bringing together of families and friends. We certainly have no criticism for this.

But anyone who is objective will recognize that it has its downside as well: Emotional highs produce emotional lows - suicides and other irrational behaviors soar during this time of year. It is the only time of year when many people indulge in alcoholic beverages, and the season is commercialized in materialistic selfishness.

This is recognized by the greatest promoters of the religious aspects of this time of the year - most denominations. Their solution - put Christ into christmas. It is on the billboards, and it is a recurring theme of their sermons this time of year. In their eyes to question this solution is the height of blasphemy. But we should question all religious practice in light of God's word (1 Thes. 5:21). Our emotions should not distract us from objectively establishing what the bible teaches with regard to these practices.

Does Christ want to be in christmas? That is the only important question! You might see many reasons that He would want to be; we can see a large number of reasons that He would not want to be. But this is all irrelevant human reasoning.

What does God want? We know that He does not want us to go beyond His word (2 Jn. 9; 1 Cor. 4:6; Rev. 22:18-19). And we know that His word says absolutely nothing about celebrating Jesus' birth on this day, or for that matter, on any other day.

In fact, scholars generally agree that Jesus was not born in the winter. The time itself manifests many practices (decorations, xmas trees, etc.) which are remnants of the pagan customs from which the holiday was derived. Would Jesus want us to change a pagan holiday and call it His birthday?

The definitive answer is given in Galatians 4:10-11, where the observance of unauthorized religious holidays is clearly forbidden. Recognize that the Galatians' traditions were previously commanded by God under the Old Testament. If these were no longer to be observed in a religious way, how much more does this principle apply to the adaption of pagan customs to our religious practice?

Christians are free to participate in the customs and observances of their society provided that it does not conflict with God's word. While many christmas customs do not present such conflicts, it is clear that pretending that all of this is "in the name of the Lord" clearly violates God's word.