Christmas in a New Light
This year, I was a bit more excited about Christmas since this was my first time celebrating Christmas in America. In my home country, we have many Christians, but I have seen that most of them were more focusing on other things than Jesus on Christmas. Even though they all know that Christmas is celebrated to remember the birth of Jesus Christ, Son of God, they just want to enjoy the day in their own ways without remembering Jesus.
So, I was looking forward to seeing something different here in America. I hope that I could see Jesus, our Messiah being more celebrated and I want to receive more messages about the Creator coming to His creation to redeem it from the eternal death. But sadly, things were not much different here in America. I realized that this American culture about Christmas also has lost its main character and shifted its focus into the dazzling decorations such as a dancing Santa Claus away from our beautiful and dazzling Savior. I guess that commercialism has already swallowed whatever it used to be before it was. Santa has become the most beloved icon in this modern culture beyond American cultures and Santa’s image is highly praised than the infant Jesus everywhere in the world. As a parent, I understand that mothers have tendency to use Christmas gifts from Santa to manipulate their children’s beheviors at some point, but this kind of manipulation entirely unbiblical. Santa means no more and no less than a man who honored Jesus Christ with his life and his possessions. As Christian parents, we should seek to instill in our children with the truth of Christmas on Christmas season and we should also watch out if Santa has taken the worship from Jesus Christ in our families’ celebration of Christmas.
In light of what a Christmas hymn, “Joy to the world” based on Psalm 98 illustrates, we can truly and rightly sing of Jesus Christ on Christmas. This hymn perfectly portrays that the coming Jesus Christ as Savior, King, and Judge is a cause of great joy for all the earth. When we know how to sing of Jesus Christ on Christmas, we can get the real image of Christmas which can form us into the real image of Christ. There is no doubt that God’s own people should sing and rejoice because God has revealed His love and salvation. The fact that our salvation depends on Jesus’ coming to the world shows that our salvation is not due in any way to human’s endeavor or good works. It is due to God’s grace alone because “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son (John 3:16)”. No greater reason to rejoice the coming Jesus could be gained than this. Anyone who knows and believes that the baby was born and the Messiah came for us from heaven may have the right to hear the chorus of the praise from an angel, “ Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people (Luke 2:10).” We, God’s own children all deserve to rejoice and sing like this, “ Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Rejoice! the Messiah has come and the baby was born for all who would believe.”
Rather than offering self-centered and man-centered worship on Christmas, I hope that we are able to do our best to bring Jesus Christ mainly on our Christmas worship. The consideration of who Jesus is, and how we worship Him on Christmas is the main key for us to get a glimpse of the true image of Jesus during this holiday season. Now is as good a time as any to recognize Jesus incarnation through the time we worship the coming Jesus on the platform.
