What is Christmas

Christmas… What is Christmas? I’ve heard a lot of things… It’s about giving….It’s about family…It’s about receiving…. It’s about forgiving… It’s about Santa Claus…. And a Sleigh full of toys, for the children the world over….

Sounds pretty good… Oh yea… it’s somebody’s birthday…. Our Lord Jesus Christ…

Who was this man, who’s birth we celebrate every year… Year after year for centuries???

A singular man who impacted history, like no other man ever…. To the point, we celebrate the winter solace, as the beginning mark for the bleak winter ahead…. Around this man’s birthday…. 

Who was this man? Well I stand with Saint Peter and say, he is the Son of the Living God….The God, who made the heavens and the earth….

So Christmas is the time we mark, as the time “The Christ” was born…. The, without dispute, most important date in man’s history.

And so we should indeed, celebrate Christmas, but we should do so in humility…. Considering the gift Christ is to the world, redemption...

We have gotten carried away with ourselves, and our own ideas, clinging to forgotten traditions, and distorting them beyond recognition, to somehow fit our own idea of what Christmas is suppose to be…

Whoooaa…. Wait just a minute there…

It wasn’t your idea…. It was the idea of the Almighty God…. It was God’s idea to come and walk among us… and God’s alone…. 

Bring this idea into your hearts and homes and the ideas of giving, of family, of receiving, of forgiving… will begin to take hold, and you will find comfort.

The Idea of Santa Claus comes from several traditions; (most of which served the same purpose), the one I grew up with was Saint Nicholas.... The idea is to introduce and create a desire in the child to search for and seek out the truth… Santa Claus is very much like Christ… He is always there; he knows all about you, he comes in the bleak of winter spreading joy and good cheer, all in reference to the birth of the Christ…

Through critical thinking on the part of the child, we realize that Mom and Dad are Santa Claus… and this tradition of searching for the truth, of critical thinking continues… serving a man his entire life. And any search for truth will lead to Christ.

So this Christmas, take a lesson from Charlie Brown, read the gospels for yourselves (Luke & Matthew), and return to the true meaning of Christmas this year… And the gift Christmas (Christ) truly is…..

And…ahhhh….. don’t buy so damn much junk! ;)

Indeed a Time to rejoice

Merry Christmas

George Henry Nichols