Christmas day is a wonderful cultural event, the summation of expectation. It is a day like none other too. Listen to the lonely car drive down the highway. See, with astonishment, Tim Horton’s CLOSED (yes, it is a Christmas miracle, the one day its workers find rest). Find the many who gather for worship at their local church. Observe how many driveways are filled with family visitors. It is the one day of the year where Canadian society stops. If you paused to notice this, it is something truly amazing. However, this same delight is ours each and every week.
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When God created the world He established time, time that would revolve around dependence upon Him through the creation of His special day. The Sabbath, or Lord’s Day, is a day to do all that we do on Christmas day, rest from work and regular activities, worship and spend time with family. Every week we can experience this delight. Every week we can experience the rejuvenation God has offered in this gift. The Sabbath was made for man, Jesus said (Mk 2:27). Will we accept this gift in faithful obedience and so find blessing week after week? 

Wherever we look in this world we find darkness; including sin within. However, there is hope in the face of this impending darkness.

In 1719 the hymnist Isaac Watts wrote the beloved carol ‘Joy to the World.’ This carol speaks volumes about joy in the midst of our darkness. Some important lines include:

Joy to the World, the Lord is come, let earth receive her king.

Jesus said, “I AM the light of the world, whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

The carol summarizes the Good News of Jesus. He is the King sent by God to bring light to the darkness. To break the curse of sin- no more let sins and sorrows grow! To let the blessings of salvation flow to those who prepare Him room and receive the King. Promising to grace them with forgiveness, new life, and joy. That is something to sing about!

Let us turn from the darkness and trust in the light of the world; walking in His light for our good and His glory.

Christmas—the real Christmas—lies buried beneath so many layers of wrapping, adornments and tradition that it is worthwhile pausing to unwrap it and find true joy.
 
DEFINING CHRISTMAS | NOUN [krísməs]
The season/day of the year when the birth of the Christ child is celebrated; God’s anointed One, the promised deliverer. In Jesus God took on human form becoming this Christ.
 
Christmas is two words: Christ and missa; Latin from the worship service’s closing prayer meaning “go” or “send” (i.e. mission).  Having celebrated the birth of Christ the early Christians went out to proclaim the glad tidings of His coming.  The first instance was in AD 336.
 
Christmas is an ancient tradition, however it endures as it is real and relevant; God’s rescue plan that enables a relationship for all who repent and believe.
 
IT’S REAL | MATTHEW 1–2 & LUKE 1–2
Confirmed by ancient Greek, Roman and Jewish sources and faithfully recorded
in the Gospel accounts, Jesus was actually born. A first ‘Christmas’ really happened.
 
Josephus (d. 100) said, “Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man.”
 
The biblical author Luke gives more detail by saying, “In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus.” You can read the whole story in Matthew 1–2 and Luke 1–2.
 
IT’S RELEVANT | JOHN 14:9 & ACTS 17:27
Christmas is not just a quaint old story; nor is God a far off and distant reality. We don’t have to wonder who God is or what He is like or how to come to know Him. Jesus said “whoever has seen Me has seen the Father” and “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” This is because Jesus is the promised Christ, the son of God.
 
IT’S ABOUT RESCUE | MATTHEW 1:21
Jesus’ name means ‘salvation.’ This is why the angel instructed Joseph to “call Him Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.” (Mt 1:21).
 
While Jesus was a wise teacher, ultimately, he was born the Christ not just to teach but to rescue sinners through His life, death and resurrection.
 
Before Christmas can be seen as good news we must first acknowledge the bad news.
 
IT ENABLES A RELATIONSHIP | LUKE 24:46–47
As sinners, we do not know God―in fact, we are enemies of God. Yet in His grace God made a way to have a relationship with Him. The appointed means was faith—trust—in the good news of His Son: that God sent His Son, Jesus, who lived and died and rose again so that those turn and trust in Him might receive forgiveness and life eternal through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Through belief in this Saviour we are reconciled with God, adopted and called to live as His children.
 
When we unpack Christmas we find that true joy and meaning comes not in the trappings but in the offer and ultimately acceptance of Christ. As the carol says, “Let every heart prepare Him room.” May your joy be made complete this Christmas by receiving God’s grace through faith in His Son, the Christ.

Christmas has always been celebrated like we presently experience it, correct? History shows a varied tradition from no celebration to celebration.

APOSTLIC (AD 33–100)
Matthew and Luke dedicate two chapters to the infancy stories of Jesus in their Gospels to show how Christ fulfilled OT prophecies. John stressed the significance of the Incarnation, “the Word became flesh.”

However, during the first century the Church did not celebrate Christmas. Emphasis was placed on the Lord’s Day as a weekly remembrance of the Resurrection, which was commemorated annually at Passover.

PATRISTIC (AD 100–500)
The Apostolic trend continued. Many early Christians even opposed remembering the birthdays of martyrs or Jesus seeing their death as their birthday.
 
The first record suggesting the date of Christ’s birth as December 25 was in AD 221 by the Christian historian Sextus Julius Africanus. (Previously it had been remembered in conjunction with His baptism on Jan 6. Some eastern churches continued to observe this but eventually Dec 25 became the majority view). Several explanations have been offered:

• The date was chosen to replace the pagan Roman celebration of dies solis invicti nati (“day of the birth of the unconquered sun,” [c.f. Mithraism]). This was a pagan winter solstice festival, joy in the midst of winter’s darkness. Saturnalia, Dec 17–21 was likewise a time of lights, parties and gift giving.
• Another saw Creation as being March 21 and Jesus’ conception—the light of the world—on the fourth day of creation. With a March 25 conception date Jesus was born on Dec 25. (Sextus)
• Still another similar view was the belief that prophets were conceived on the same day as their death. If Christ died on March 25, adding 9 months to His birth brings you to Dec 25. (Pseudo-Crysostom?).

While the later theories are plausible that Dec 25 ‘baptized’ pagan traditions to weaken them is the most likely. Missiologically this was clever but not without danger.
 
That Christmas replaced pagan festivals is further evidenced in when the first Christmas is recorded. It was in Rome in AD 336, after Constantine had made Christianity legal and even the favoured religion of the Empire. As a result the 4th century saw a “powerful trend towards a greater use of ritual and ceremony.” (NN1.97). From Rome this new ceremony spread, attested by numerous 4th century sources.
 
Christmas is two words: Christ and missa; Latin from the worship service’s closing prayer meaning “go” or “send” (i.e. mission).  Having celebrated the birth of Christ Christians went out to proclaim the glad tidings of His coming. 
 
Still Christmas was a smaller festival compared to the Passover/Easter and the growing traditions of Holy Week and Lent until the 9th century when it attained its own liturgy. Christological debates also helped to cement the importance of Christmas (e.g. Chalcedon, 451)
 
MEDAIEVAL (AD 500–1500)
Festivals surrounding the remembrance of Christ’s birth proliferated during the Middle Ages. The basic pattern was present by AD 600: Advent (24 days before Christmas, c. 500s), Christmastide (12 days of Christmas beginning Dec 25–Jan 5), which ended with Epiphany, Jan 6 (wise men). Christmas became part of the elaborate series of festivals to saints and other holy days. The development of a Church year or calendar was ‘complete.’ Gifts were first given in the 1400s.

REFORMATIONS (1500–1600)
At the Reformation Lutherans and Anglicans modified and simplified the celebration of Christmas but retained it (e.g. Martin Luther wrote ‘Away in a Manger’). The Reformed, Puritans and Presbyterians did not celebrate Christmas. They saw it as a Catholic tradition with no warrant in the Bible. They followed the regulative principle.

POST-REFORMATION (1600–1700)
Parallel traditions, some celebrating Christmas and others not continued amongst Protestants. Puritans in England and New England banned Christmas altogether. Baptists were part of this tradition who until the late 1800s did not celebrate Christmas. Still, within the Dissenting tradition new carols were written like Isaac Watts’ ‘Joy to the World’ (Congregationalist) and ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing by Charles Wesley (Methodist). From hymnbooks some Dissenters sang at least some carols around Dec 25. Gift giving also increased during this period.

MODERN (1800s–1900s)
For many Protestants, the presence of high-church traditions coupled with Romanticism (feeling and expression), biblical liberalism and the softening of denominational traditions due to deconfessionalism all contributed to a rise of the celebration of Christmas in traditions which hadn’t previous placed great or any emphasis upon them.

The Victorian age was one of expression. Carols proliferated. Cards were given (first commercial, 1843). Industrialization made affordable gifts available, beginning the commercialization of Christmas.

The Christmas tree, which had been a German tradition dating to the 1500s, was brought into England from the Germany by the Prince Consort (1848) and made popular by Queen Victoria. Given Germany was one of the later European nations to be evangelized there is an evident link to medieval paganism, and even tree worship in ancient paganism. Slowly trees made there way into church sanctuaries.

Perhaps the largest change to Christmas during this time relates to the mythical figure of Santa Claus. Rooted in Saint Nicolas with pagan embellishments, through commercialization, the man in the big red suit co-existed beside Christ, often even in Christian circles.

Many of these trends continued into the 1900s; culture and Christianity co-existing and often being tightly interwoven, Christmas culminating on the 25 rather than the 6th of January.  

POST-MODERN (late 1900s–2000s)
By the late 1900s it became clear Christ had been forced out of Christmas. Some advanced ‘political correctness’ such as “happy holidays.” Christmas was now about Santa and gifts and family. ‘Keep Christ in Christmas,’ was the slogan of conservative advocates.  

REFLECTION
Christmas is not inherent to Christianity but was developed, along with associated symbolism, over 1700 years.  

One of the blessings of the Post-Christian scene is that it is ripe for reflecting upon Christian beliefs and practices (ecclesia semper reformanda est, the Church is always to be reforming):

1. The Lord’s Day along the Lord Supper are what we are commanded to remember, however, given the weight in the narrative to establish the New Covenant of Jesus life, death, resurrection and sending forth of the Spirit, I think it appropriate to modestly commemorate: the birth of Christ (Incarnation/Christmas), His Death and Resurrection (Passover/Good Friday and “Easter”) and the sending of His Spirit (Pentecost).
   1. Faced with secular Christmas other Protestants feel a pull in the opposite direction, to find meaning in post-Christianity by embracing elements of the Church year.  
2. Given how few non-Christians attend any Christmas services I think worship at Christmas will shift toward an occasion for believers to worship, remember and be instructed (vs. outreach or a community event). This in turn will deepen and refine our traditions. Ultimately, this will produce lives and worship gatherings that will be of greater interest to the earnest inquirers of our culture and those we’re witnessing to.

Some of our Christmas traditions will change, vary from church to church or disappear altogether. However, the fact that Christ was born will remain a cardinal Christian belief.
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Bibliography
Oxford Dictionary of Christian History
Encyclopaedia Britannica
Nick Needham, 2000 Years of Christ’s Power

Christmas of 2022 was unusual for many congregations, we had a blizzard that closed roads and forced many churches to suspend their Christmas Day services. The second thing that was unusual was that Christmas Day and the Lord’s Day coincided, something that only happens every few years.
For our culture Christmas (without the Christ) is the high holy day of the year. On Christmas even the shops are closed, family is a focus (which in itself is good), the pagan myths are brought out and of course there is the worship of self through materialism. For our culture Christmas is paramount.
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For Christians, it is not wrong to remember the Incarnation, but our high holy day, a New Testament ordinance, is the Lord’s Day. It is the day we remember the Resurrection. It is the day we express our dependence upon the Lord, and that our lives revolve around Him. It is His day through which we honour and worship Him in a special way. It is the day on which the church gathers. Every Sunday, including when it is Christmas Day, we do not neglect to meet together (Heb 10:25). This is because Christians believe God’s will for the church is set forth in the New Testament. We do not get to choose how to live and worship, He does. 

​“It’s the most wonderful time of the year.” Speaking of time (and something that occurs occasionally) Christmas Day and New Year’s Day will both occur on the Lord’s Day (Sunday). How will you spend your day? Will worship be at the centre of it? Because the Lord is interested in how we spend our time and commands us to gather on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:22; Revelation 1:10; Hebrews 10:25). Christ comes before Christmas (and New Year’s). Did you know that Christians didn’t celebrate Christmas until about AD 354? That’s because the Lord’s Day (and its remembrance of the Resurrection) stood as the central time of worship. While a significant event Christ never commanded us to remember Christmas (or New Year’s) but He did command us to gather together each week. English Protestants, right up until the late 1800s, including Baptists, did not celebrate Christmas and even worked on Christmas Day. In another extreme, today Christmas has become its own sacred day of self for many. It’s a day I sleep in; a day I spend with family; a day I open presents and do tradition x, y or z. It’s the only day of the year Tim Horton’s is closed! But for Christians worshipping Christ in His way on His day comes before Christmas. As such I think it is most sad to hear of many churches that will be closed on Christmas Day as Christians put human traditions (even good ones) ahead of Christ. As those who often chanted “Keep Christ in Christmas” it is rather ironic. At MBC we want to put Christ first and build our meaningful family time and Christmas traditions around Him. (If you have non-Christian family members with you, let your priority in worship be a witness to them; or invite them along). We’ll still be meeting on Christmas morning, though at 1030 instead of the usual 10 (and we won’t be holding our evening service). This will allow families times to do their thing when they wake up and for the rest of the day, yet still keep Christ central; after all, that’s what the first Christmas in AD 354 was all about, a worship service to remember the birth of Christ. I pray that whether we’re away and visiting another church or here at home, we’ll keep Christ in Christmas and so maintain the true wonder, the wonder of worship. 

I remember about a decade ago it was thought that Canada Post would soon be obsolete with the dawn of the electronic communication era. Today the online shopping revolution has meant that Canada Post (and other carriers) are busier than ever. One reason, despite the rising cost of stamps, is that in our digital age people are actually reverting (or advancing?) to sending letters. Think how impersonal a text or email can be; they’re surely easy to send and free. Not so with a letter. You need to pick out a card or paper, you need to take the time to write something with real ink, your hand and eye being intricately involved in the process. Then you need to seal the envelope, buy a stamp and then get that letter to the Post Office (It then travels about and a real person delivers it to you). While still a relatively simple form of communication it is actually an involved process that breathes connection and relationality. The impersonality of our electronic age is seeing letters make a return. I’m always delighted to receive a letter, especially from overseas.
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In the ancient world, to write a letter, on parchment or papyrus (costly resources because of the time involved in preparing them) was a very intentional thing. There was no whiteout or delete buttons. Every word mattered. The intentional inspiration of Scripture is therefore a wonder, especially when scroll lengths are considered.

In a sense letters are actually a thing divine for through them God chose to reveal Himself to us.
We’re presently reading one of them—Revelation—which is a letter to the Seven Churches!

I first became interested in Biblical letters, ironically, not through the Epistles but through a letter Elijah wrote to Jehoram (2 Chr 21:12) Here Elijah challenged Judah’s idolatry. While difficult or sensitive matters are usually best reserved for in person conversations, sometimes they can be effective when written in the right spirit (they give people something to come back to) or when in person conversations may be impossible. John Newton once had to write such a letter and said he sought to, “play the part of a friend by letter.”

Perhaps most famously were Paul’s letters to the Corinthians. He actually wrote several letters, only two making it into the Bible. Having founded and pastored the church, it became shipwrecked. He wrote a previous letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor 5:9), then 1 Corinthians, followed by a visit (2 Cor 2:1), followed by a “sorrowful” letter (2 Cor 2:3) and then 2 Corinthians. Sometimes difficult letters are necessary and effective.

However, in person meetings are ideal. This is what John expressed, though in more positive circumstances, when he wrote in 2 Jn 12, Though I have much to write to you, I would rather not use paper and ink. Instead I hope to come to you and talk face to face, so that our joy may be complete.
 
One day, there will be no need for difficult letters and time will abound to fellowship with the saints; until then, however, the Lord has given us letters.
 

Even prior to the Premier’s announcement of a lockdown today, Christmas and New Year’s, for many people, was going to look much different than the season of faith, family and merriment that many people often associate with the season. The lockdown announced for Boxing Day will make this an even more difficult season for many.

To put this in perspective (and provide encouragement) and to remember that Christmas is about Christ—that He is all we need for a blessed Christmas or to live a blessed life in the face of trials—let us turn to the first Christmas story to contemplate just how difficult it would have been for Joseph and Mary and how Christ made all the difference.

Though they had no Christmas by which to evaluate their lived experience, the first Christmas was no easy time for Mary and Joseph. Notwithstanding the shame the couple probably faced because of the pre-marital pregnancy, they had to travel away from their comfort zone and support network, from Nazareth to Bethlehem. While not a long distance by modern standards, it was far enough by ancient standards. We might think that because Joseph was “of the house and lineage of David” that he would have had close family to call in on. However, Luke’s silence on this matter leads us to believe that Joseph’s roots were more connected to Nazareth than they were to Bethlehem; otherwise some relative probably would have made room for them. As it stood, homes and inns full because of the census, the couple were all alone in a foreign town and had to take shelter in a stable, “because there was no place for them in the inn.” (Lk 2:7). Bad travel plans, a grotty motel—not to mentioned being 9 months pregnant—it all seemed as if their stay would be a miserable one. But the cherish story of the nativity is far from unhappy because Jesus made all the difference.

Trusting God’s providence in the situation, looking to Him, Joseph and Mary were pleasantly surprise that first Christmas. The promised One of old, revealed as the expected child through prophecies, dreams and visions, finally arrived. The birth of any child has the effect of bringing joy to troubled circumstances; how much greater must have their joy been to welcome the Christ child!? Then unexpected visitors dropped in and told of angelic choirs rejoicing at the Saviour’s birth. God was encouraging the couple. Mary treasured and “pondered these things in her heart” as the shepherds went away “glorifying and praising God.” It is amazing how faith in God’s providence and the presence of Christ can bring joy to otherwise discouraging circumstances!
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The Christmas holidays of 2020–21 will certainly be different, but they needn’t be as grim as Satan may tempt us to think. May it be that God is stripping away all of the distractions and adornments of the holidays: goodies, good company, traditions, etc, etc, so that we might focus exclusively on Jesus? As we worship Christ at Christmas may we be filled with all the joy and wonder Joseph and Mary were on that first bleak mid-winter Christmas night, and may we be a light in the darkness.

[To read a blog on the history of Santa Claus click here]

Recently, my wife was taking our son, who turns two and a half on Christmas Day, through the checkout. In that tone by which adults can sometimes speak to young children, the cashier asked my son, “Have you gotten your letter off to Santa already? What did you ask for?” He stared at her with a blank look, he didn’t know what she was talking about, not because he couldn’t understand her but because he—intentionally—hasn’t been taught about the modern myth of Santa. My wife respectfully responded to the cashier, “we don’t celebrate Santa, we remember Jesus’ birth at Christmas.” The cashier looked somewhat confounded by my wife’s answer; that a child would be deprived of the happiness of believing in such a myth, however, as my wife was respectful the conversation ended—though somewhat awkwardly on her part—with politeness and a seed being sown for her to think about.

Is such a view being too Grinch like or is their wisdom in such a view?

I for one was part of the syncretistic Christian culture of past decades that fused Jesus and Santa together. I cringe to remember that our local church even brought Santa into the church for the service. To the contrary my wife’s family grew up not teaching her and her siblings about the myth of Santa, instead focusing on the real meaning of Christmas. When my wife told her friend (who happened to be my 2nd cousin) that Santa wasn’t real, she burst into tears and my wife ended up in the principal’s office with a call home to her mom!

As a maturing Christian, and now a parent, I’ve moved from how I was raised to the view my wife and I hold today: to not perpetuate the culturally embraced myth of Santa but focus on the real reason of Christmas. We don’t do this in a Grinch like spirit and so far from spoiling joy for our son, his joy is made complete.

Here are three reasons why we don’t teach him the myth of Santa (there are many more):

1. We don’t want to lie to our son.

If Santa is a myth (though the origin in Nicolas of Myra certainly is not), then why would we want to lie to him? The Bible teaches parents ought not to provoke their children (Eph 6:4), seek what’s spiritually best for them (Dt 6); how then would lying to them be helpful, both for their spiritual development but also their view of your character? If we lied here would he trust us in other areas, even if it was a lie “just for fun”? We want to encourage our children to be faithful to the 9th commandment (Ex 20:16), not to break it (or break it ourselves!). We want to encourage them to seek truth in the person of Jesus (Jn 8:32).

1. We don’t want to promote an unhealthy message that is contrary to the Gospel.

The modern myth of Santa is diametrically opposed to the Gospel. See two excellent videos that contrast the message of Santa and the message of Jesus here and here. If this is so, why would we want to confuse our children with a message of self, material joy and hope and reliance on someone other than God? These are root spiritual problems. Rather we should want to point our children to the message that Christ came “to save His people from their sins” (Mt 1:21) to save each boy and girl, man and woman, who’d repent and trust in Him for their forgiveness. The real meaning of Christmas is a far better message, one that is real and one that can change your life forever.

1. Why settle for a meagre substitute of joy when real joy is on offer?

The joy of the Christmas message itself, and ultimately accepting that as your own, has stood the test of time and is sufficient to bring joy in darkness such that no other message is needed or can rival it. It brings me great delight when our son, far from being robbed of joy, sings this simple song that his mother taught him from her childhood, with great joy:

Come on ring those bells,
Everybody sing,
Jesus is the King,
Born for you and me.
Come on ring those bells,
Everybody sing,
Jesus we remember it’s your birthday.
 
How do we celebrate Christmas with our son? We tell him about Jesus and the Christmas story and the Gospel. We explain that all of the adornments of Christmas (greenery, goodies, etc) are all to help us celebrate the Incarnation. We give him gifts, in love, from mummy and daddy, and say that we give gifts because God gave the greatest gift of all, His Son. And that is something worth celebrating!

Ever wonder where the modern myth of Santa Claus came from? The clue is in the word “modern” as he’s only been around really since the early 1800s. Building upon the European popularity of Saint Nicolas (Sinter Klaus, Father Christmas, Kris Kringle, etc) in the late 1700 and early 1800s Dutch residents in New York popularized the tradition in the New World. In the early 1800s a growing commercialism likewise took hold of the gift giving tradition which translated into advertisement and shopping mall Santas. In 1822 the Episcopal minister, C.C. Moore, wrote the poem “Twas the night before Christmas,” which added many other elements to the gift giving tradition, including reindeer. In 1881 Thomas Nast illustrated the modern image of Santa.  In the 1890s the Salvation Army sent unemployed men dresses as Santa to collect donations. In the 1930s and 40s the lore receive a huge boost through film, namely Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (’39) and Miracle on 34th Street (’47). Songs such as “Santa Claus is coming to Town” (’34) and Coca-Cola advertisements did much to embed the popular conceptions. Such modern myths have nothing to do with the real meaning of Christmas (the birth of Christ) and very very little to do with the real saint Nick.[1]
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Santa Claus means Saint Nicolas, it is a derivative of Dutch and ultimately Latin. Sainthood was an idea that slowly developed from the Patristic period and into the Mediaeval Ages to honour exemplary Christians (to the earliest Christians, grounded in the teaching of Scripture, saw every believe as a saint, or a holy and chosen one of God in Christ). Nicolas was one such man, an Overseer from Myra in Lycia (south western Turkey) in the late third to early fourth centuries. Very little is known about him, though even after his death he remained very popular. He was imprisoned during the persecution of Emperor Diocletian. There are many reports that he attended the important Church council of Nicaea. A church was first built in his honour in Constantinople (Istanbul) in AD 565 and a shrine arose around his supposed burial location in AD 1087 in Bari (southern Italy). He became the patron saint of children because he is said to have inherited great wealth which he gave away. Famously he is said to have rescued three young girls from being sold into prostitution by purchasing their freedom and providing them with a dowry.[2] Inevitably this man became renowned for his kindness and generosity. As a Christian, such charity was surely rooted in the generosity of God’s grace shown to him in Christ, and were an outpouring of his changed life as an adornment of the Gospel (Tit 2:10), forsaking wealth and storing up treasure in Heaven. How very different the real Nicholas is from the modern myth of Santa Claus. Isn’t truth refreshing? May he be our example to look to Christ this Christmas and embrace a Christ-like kindness and generosity that is the fruit of faith, a faith we all so desperately need.


[1] https://www.history.com/topics/christmas/santa-claus

[2] F.L. Cross, ed., Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (1958), 955.