Now what of Christmas ? But what of the fact that December 25 was the date of a pagan festival? Does this not prove that Christmas is pagan? No, it does not. Instead, it proves that Christmas was established as a rival celebration to the pagan festival. That is, what Christians did was to say, Rather than celebrate in immorality the birth of Mithra, a false god who was never really born and who cannot save you, let us celebrate in joyful righteousness the birth of Jesus, the true God incarnate who is the Savior of the world. What is frequently overlooked is that the churchs choice of December 25 was intentional. Instead of Christianizing a pagan festival, the church established a rival celebration. While the world has all but forgotten the Greco-Roman gods of antiquity, they are annually reminded that two thousand years ago Christ invaded time and space. Sometimes it is urged that to take a pagan festival and try to Christianize it is folly. However, God Himself did exactly that in the Old Testament. Historical evidence shows conclusively that some of the feasts given to Israel by God through Moses were originally pagan agricultural festivals, which were filled with idolatrous imagery and practices. What God did, in effect, was to establish feasts which would replace the pagan festivals without adopting any of the idolatry or immorality associated with them. It would appear, then, that in principle there is nothing wrong with doing so in the case of Christmas. Furthermore before paganism ever existed God planted the heavens and the earth and established the cycles and the sun and the moon. This means every day in our Calendar is from God. It is Gods days not mans days. Therefore the fact that paganism and witches takes days from the year to make it their own time for idolatry does not mean that the day itself becomes bad and we are to avoid that day. I repeat again, the 365 days that God made is not mans it is Gods. If man makes a day pagan it has no impact on the fact that it is still Gods day. Did you know that there are pagan rituals that happen at the same time as Easter. Must we forget Easter at this time because of other pagan events associate with this period. Are we running out of days in the year? Or is the earth (and the universe including time and space) the lords and the fullness therein we are at liberty to celebrate Jesus on any day. In fact the celebration of Jesus should be a daily event anyway. It is important to realize the reason Christianity is so divided is because we spend too much time focusing on the branches and not the root of importance. What is important is believing that Christ was born of a virgin woman as Immanuel. That is the absolute root. Whether you believe we should celebrate it or not is of secondary importance (and great for debate as iron sharpeneth iron) but what is of primary absolute importance (no negotiation) is ensuring you recognize and believe in the birth of Christ after all the Bible says he denies that Jesus came in the flesh is antichrist. Colossians 2:16-17 So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ. The coming of Christ which we celebrate is a shadow of things to come because at his second coming he will be with us eternally. Finally yes God destroyed Israel in the past when they made the Golden Calf to represent him because they made a Golden Calf. However when celebrate Christmas we are not celebrating it by making golden calves, we are going back to the bible to remind us of the nativity. This is all said in love and those what have their reasons not to celebrate its no problem. But let us remember calling each other false prophets and pagans is not ideal especially when the bible provides room for variance within the body of Christ. i.e. those that want to eat meat or not eat meat, those that want to celebrate Christ on a particular day or not. Celebrating the birth of Christ is a secondary issue that we can vigorously debate but it is the actual reality that Christ did come and was born of a virgin that is the primary issue that we should never ever divide over. Finally in a world which is replacing Christmas with Xmas and the bible story with winter wonderland, the christian message in December remains a powerful witness amongst a world which has no regard at all for Jesus birth and life period.
Posted on: Sat, 27 Dec 2014 16:30:17 +0000
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