Are you also wrapped up in shopping and cooking and decorating? Not to mention cleaning the house and writing cards? have you paused to contemplate why you are doing all that? That is interesting, how people go about making traditions their goals in life. Are you happy because of this rush? Well, if you are, then this text is not for you, but then again, maybe it is? Because maybe your experience of happiness is false?
When I was a child, I loved Christmas time because of several reasons. Oranges and bananas were in the shops, for one. Oh, you do not understand? I was born and raised in Poland during the communist regime there, which meant empty shelves in the shops, sort of today's Cuba. And the only season we could enjoy exotic fruit was Christmas and Easter. Come to think of it, it is peculiar that communists honored those two Christian holidays. Maybe they had some conscience left?
One of the other reasons were the presents under the tree. My parents could not afford much, but there was always something I had wished and it made me happy. The third reason was the food - special dishes prepared only for this one season, very delicious and yummy. To be honest, I still miss those, since I no longer live with my parents and the food I cook only slightly reminds my mother's kitchen...
But apart from those carnal joys there was not much more. A real drag, on the other end of the scale, was the midnight mass at our catholic church. The church is humongous, capable of accommodating 12 000 people at a time, but during those midnight masses there were double the amount of people inside, which forced us, young ones, to stand up for 2 hours and suffer terribly. I hated it.
I admit - it was probably my own fault that I never gave a second and deeper thought into the real meaning of Christmas. Traditionalism of the whole experience took it all, leaving no place for Jesus.
To believe in those times for me was to fulfill ceremonies and duties, mostly unwillingly, and my heart was somewhere else.
So what is Christmas to a Bible-believing Christian, to a new-born soul who is starting to crawl as a baby in Christ?
This first Christmas in my new life will be the time of meditation, time of appreciation, time of joy and time of prayer. Christ came to us, God incarnate, to suffer for my sins, to take my sins upon Himself, to spare me from eternal damnation. This was no little baby coming! This baby knew everything, He was our Redeemer from the very first breath out of womb! Those people visiting Him knew it, Mary knew it, Joseph knew it...
This is joy mixed with pain, immense weight of my sins that He took. The moment He became a man, He knew what was before Him. Every single step was in His mind, clear and certain. Just think for a moment - the Almighty God humbles Himself and empties Himself for a sinner, and chooses the human life in order to save this sinner from death.
Of course the time of the celebration is not right. But we really do not know the right date, do we? Since we celebrate our own birthdays, how much more important is not the birthday of our Lord? His human birthday, that is.
So what am I going to do, practically, this year?
Traditions - yes, tree and decorations - yes, food - yes, presents - yes.
But this time, for the first time in my life, with the real MEANING of it. Jesus is born to us, Savior is come, praise the Lord God for His love and mercy, rejoice in the fulfillment of prophecies, remember the facts of these days 2000 years ago.
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