The God of Christmas
The God of Christmas
If I were to ask you, "what time of the year will you find the most drunkenness, revelry, lying, covertness, volunteer indebtedness, immoral activates and hypocrisy than any other time," what would your answer be? If you are like most people, you would not hesitate to say "Christmas". The sad truth is, this is what Christmas has become in our society today. Now I know that there are many Christians who take time out of their Christmas day to read about the birth of Christ, and to sing a few "Christmas" songs. I know that many Christians send out "Christmas" cards with bible verses on them, and I know that some even spend part of Christmas Eve going around singing from house to house. Yet, given the importance of this event, these activities seem to be less Christ honoring then what they should. After all, isn't Christmas supposed to be about the birth of Jesus Christ? Isn't it supposed to be "all about Him?"
During this time of year, many well meaning Christians will use phrases like, "Jesus is the reason for the season", and "lets put Christ back in Christmas". But, the truth is, Christ was never in Christmas. Christmas is a holiday shared and celebrated by many religions, and even pre-dates the birth of Christ. The spirit of Christmas causes people to decorate their homes and churches, cut down trees and bring them into their homes, decking them with silver and gold. In the light of that tree, families make merry and give gifts one to another. On Dec. 24, families, friends and churches prepare for participation in customs such as burning the Yule log, singing around the decorated tree, kissing under the mistletoe and holly, and attending a late night service or midnight mass. But, where did Christmas come from? What is the meaning of Christmas? Where did the customs and traditions originate? Surely you, as a Christian, would want to worship the Lord in Spirit and in truth, discerning good from evil.
The date of December 25th comes from Rome and was a celebration of the Italic god, Saturn, and the rebirth of the sun god. It was noted by the pre-Christian Romans and other pagans, that daylight began to increase after December 22nd, when they assumed that the sun god had died. These pagans believed that the sun god rose from the dead three days later as the new-born and venerable sun. Thus, they figured that to be the reason for increasing daylight. This was a cause for much excitement and celebration. Gift giving and parties filled the temples of ancient Rome, as sacred priests of Saturn, called dendrophori, carried wreaths of evergreen branches in procession.
In Germany, the evergreen tree was used in worship and celebration of the Yule god, also in observance of the resurrected sun god. In many cultures, the evergreen tree is a symbol of the essence of life and was regarded as a phallic symbol in fertility worship. But it gets worse. Witches and other pagans regarded the red holly as a symbol of the menstrual blood of the queen of heaven, also known as Diana and the white berries of mistletoe were believed by pagans Witches to represent droplets of the semen of the sun god. But, these customs, and more, transcended the borders of Rome and Germany to the far reaches of the known world.
The question now arises: How did all of these customs find their way into contemporary Christianity, ranging from Catholicism to Protestantism to fundamentalist churches? The word "Christmas" itself reveals who married paganism to Christianity, and is a combination of the words "Christ" and "Mass.
The word "Mass" means death and was coined originally by the Roman Catholic Church, and belongs exclusively to the Church of Rome. The ritual of the Mass involves the death of Christ, and the distribution of the "Host", a word taken from the Latin word "hostiall" meaning victim! In short, Christmas is strictly a Roman Catholic word. A simple study of the tactics of the Roman Church reveals that in every case, the church absorbed the customs, traditions and general paganism of every tribe, culture and nation in their efforts to increase the number of people under their control. In short, the Roman church told all of these pagan cultures, "Bring your gods, goddesses, rituals and rites, and we will assign Christian sounding titles and names to them".
When Martin Luther started the reformation on October 31st, 1517, and other reformers followed his lead, all of them took with them the paganism that was so firmly imbedded in Rome, leaving Christmas intact. In England, as the authorized Bible became available to the common people by the decree of King James the II in 1611, people began to discover the pagan roots of Christmas, and a movement away from this holiday started. At one point, the Puritans in England, and later in Massachusetts Colony, outlawed this holiday as witchcraft.
Near the end of the nineteenth century, when other Bible versions began to appear, there was a revival of the celebration of Christmas. We are now seeing ever-increasing celebrating of Christmas or Yule, its true name, as we draw closer to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ! This stands true in both witchcraft circles and contemporary Christian churches, as groups from all walks of life embrace this day as a day of celebration.
So you see my friend, Jesus was never the reason for the season. He was grafted in as an "afterthought", but He was never the reason for it. Satan on the other hand is the mastermind behind the whole thing... Satan, that great liar and deceiver has used this time of year to get our eyes off of God's deity, and to focus rather on His humanity. Jesus is God incarnate. That is, He left heaven to come to earth and be born of a virgin, but He did it so He could die for our sins...so that He could die for your sins. As a child of God, we are commanded to come out of the world and to have nothing to do with the worlds pagan practices (2 Cor. 6:14-18 / Rev. 18:4). Jesus is not 2000 years old, He is eternal. And, although He did take on human form through a child born of a virgin, He Himself is eternal. He does not have birthdays. Any student of the Bible knows that Jesus was in the beginning, and He created all things.
Also, it should be noted, that Jesus never told us to remember His birth. He did however instruct us to remember His death (1 Cor. 11:26). This is understood, not only in the fact there are no Scriptures commanding us to remember His birth, and also in the fact that the early Church never celebrated His birth. In fact, God's people never celebrate birthdays. That was a pagan practice and the Jews refused to have part of it. In fact, there are only two birthday celebrations mentioned in the Bible. One is found in the Old Testament, and the other is found in the New Testament. Both were wicked heathen men, and during both celebrations, a godly, innocent man was killed for his faith and life. I think you will recall the birthday celebration of Pharaoh. During his celebration, he hung the chief baker (Gen. 40:20-23) as Joseph had interpreted it would happen. And then you will recall King Harod and his birthday party. This time, John the Baptist lost his head at the request of Herodias' daughter (Mat. 14:1-10).
So, because celebrating birthdays is a pagan celebration, and because it was never commanded by our Lord, practiced by His disciples or the early Church, and, because of it pagan, Roman Catholic Church roots, celebrating Christmas is not honoring to Christ at all, but actually it is dishonoring. Also, because of the wickedness that takes place during this time of year, even by many who profess Christ, it is wise to have no part of it.
Hear the Words of the Lord, spoken of through Jeremiah, "Hear ye the words which the LORD speaketh unto you, O house of Israel: Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe (V. 1-4)
In the end, this article really does not even address the issue of teaching our children to lie or instilling in our youth the seeds of covertness. So, what should a Christian do? Well, that is up to you. We know that God has told us to "come out from among them and be ye separate". We know that God's Word says "friendship with the world is [hatred] towards God". And we know that God's Word is suppose to be the final authority in everything we do.
So, what should we do? Well, we could go on recognizing this day as the day we remember Christ birth. There probably is nothing to stop that. However, we should remove ourselves from the pagan portions of the holiday. We should keep our focus completely on Christ, and who, and what, He has done for us. We should take the opportunity to bring others to Him, and we should not participate in any of the secular, pagan practices whatsoever. We need to admit we have been wrong. We need to confess our worldly, wicked, compromise and we need to start from this point doing what is right. Pastors, what will you do? Will you continue teaching your congregation to observe this pagan, ungodly, Satan honoring holiday? Fathers, do you have enough of a backbone to tell your family you are not going to participate in this worldly celebration again? Christian, will you continue dishonoring your Saviour by dragging Him into the middle of this Roman Catholic compromise, or will you say "no"?
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