Have Yourself A Mary Little Christmas!
Luke 10:38-42
I will admit it from the start that I am not enthralled about Christmas. Yes, when I was a kid I was into it like every other kid. What ruined it for me? Going to Bible College and studying the Word, Church History and various other courses pretty much kicked Christmas off my list of things to do.
Yes, I endure it from year to year and in an effort to be sociable or non-divisive, I have even read parts for plays or cantatas and attended parties. For the most part, I slide out of anything connected to it. I will share some of the reasons that I do not desire to participate and why I do not think born-again believers, especially Baptists, should do so. However, knowing that is not going to go over big and most people will consider me a twit and maybe a cultist, I will also give advice to those who feel they must continue the practice.
Luke 10:38-42
38 Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house.
39 And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word.
40 But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me.
41 And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things:
42 But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her. (KJV)
In these passages, we have almost a perfect picture of the average Christmas person in Martha. Therefore, I suggest that you have a Mary little Christmas, if you must have one by first forgetting the flurry! People go absolutely bonkers trying to have the merriest Christmas ever by fighting each other in crowded malls over the latest fad item on the market that is extremely overpriced and will be picked up for a song most likely by the next Christmas. The presents must be better than they were last year and the feast and the tree must be bigger all in the name of celebrating Christ’s birth.
This sounds a lot like what Martha was doing. She was distracted. She was irritable and critical. (Vs 40) She was flying around the house trying to prepare this wonderful meal for Jesus getting all flustered and frustrated eventually lashing out at her sister. She even tried to pull Jesus into her frustration wanting Him to chastise her sister for her laziness, selfishness, unconcern and lack of appreciation of whom they were entertaining and getting ready to serve. She appealed to His authority to command Mary to get on the stick.
What she failed to see was that all Christ wanted was to be received. (Vs. 38) He wanted to be welcomed into their home and indeed into their hearts. He traveled about and undoubtedly had stayed in houses far more humble then hers and ate meals not nearly as grand as she was preparing. Yes, it appears that they were a wealthy family and were in a position to do more for Him in the way of lodging and meals, but that was not why He came there. He came because He loved them and wanted to fellowship with them. He wanted to teach them and enjoy their presence.
He had fed thousands with just a small order of fish and bread. He could have materialized a banquet like they could not have imagined out of nothing, but He was not into that. If He had been, He would have chosen to be born into royalty not as a carpenter’s son in a manger. Martha missed the whole point of His coming by her distraction and false assumptions of His will. Multitudes do the same thing every year during Christmas.
You can have a Mary little Christmas by focusing on first things! The things troubling us will pass. (Vs. 41) Martha was all excited about the meal and such, but in reality as much time and effort she put into it would soon be done and they would be clearing the table and doing the dishes. Hours of effort would be over in a moment and just be a memory after a few days.
All the preparation for that one big day will be over in no time and all you will have are wrappings and boxes to throw away and a mess of pine needles from a dead tree to clean up. Many folks will not enjoy it nearly as much as they could because they will be exhausted, irritable and broke as well as frustrated because they can sense that Aunt Millie did not like the gift they had run all over town to find. The kids will find a way to break at least one toy in a matter of minutes and the batteries will be dead shortly thereafter in the toys they did not break.
Soon after we get out of the gift return lines and go back to work much of the flurry will be forgotten only to be remembered each month when the credit card bill is received. The kids will be bored with their stuff barely after New Year’s Day whining they have nothing to play with or wear. You will be looking for overtime to pay off the bills, which will take you away from your family and anger you as you see what taxes are taken out of the big check you expected. By the time you start to see daylight and chill out it will be time to do it again. Much time is wasted needlessly.
Our time with Christ is needful and eternal. (Vs. 39,42) Christ told Martha that Mary had chosen the good part or portion that would not be taken away from her. Mary sat at Jesus’ feet and got to know Him, His will, and His love for her. Mary might lose everything in her life, her wealth, her social standing, her health and even her life one day, but that time with Christ would never be taken away from her. It would get her through any of those losses and would only be enhanced, enriched and completed at death. Martha’s magnificent meal would be in the draught the next day, but oh the eternal work that would be wrought in Mary’s soul from that time spent with Him! Most are way too busy to even spend time with Him on what is supposed to be His day! What a terrible loss!!!
Finally, we can have a Mary little Christmas by focusing on the facts. He never asked us to remember or celebrate His birth. We are to show forth His death until He returns. (I Cor 11:23,24)
His virgin birth was miraculous and needful for His mission, but not the mission itself. His many miracles were great, but were not His mission. His perfect life without sin aided His mission, but was not His mission. Even His ascension into Heaven was really spectacular, but none of those things we are told to celebrate. It is His death and resurrection that we need to celebrate!!
Do you not realize that if Christ had been born of a virgin, lived a sinless life full of miracles and ascended into Heaven without the Cross and resurrection we would still be in our sins? That is what we are to commemorate as oft as we do it. It is this hope that the world needs to have. It is the bloody Cross and empty tomb that separates Christianity from all the "isms" ever known to man. It is this Gospel or Good News that we should be rejoicing about every day! The word holiday is holy day truncated. Every day is to be a holy day. (I Peter 2:9) Our life should be a celebration of His death, burial, and resurrection thus affirming His return as the living Savior!
Some will say that what can be wrong with celebrating His birth? Nothing except that we should do it right and realize that our traditions are not truth. (Mark 7:13) We are in bondage to our traditions. To break them is to be a Grinch or Scrooge. Indeed, many may be getting close to cussing me for even daring to speak against Christmas. They will think I am a Jehovah Witness or worse. However, let us look at a few things and see if we can find logic, Scripture or spirituality to justify our traditions.
First, if it is Jesus’ birthday we are celebrating does He get any gifts? More often than not, He will get a nod of assent that it is His birthday, but we put Him in a corner of the room while we party with each other and swap gifts. We may point at Him now and then use Him as the "reason for the season" while we pollute it with stories of other omniscient, omnipotent beings that judge people and brings their rewards with them. Indeed, we lie to our children about one such being and then wonder why they may have some problem accepting that we are telling the truth about the real Giver of perfect gifts later. Just because it is a neat story and so cute to have our kid’s pictures taken with some dude in a red suit doesn’t make it kosher.
Almost all of the trappings are pagan that the Catholics brought into the church. We know this or at least some of us do and we just ignore it and use the "under grace" catch-all when we like what we are doing and don’t want to deal with reality and study to discern good from evil. What communion has light with darkness? Where do we stop rightly dividing the Word of truth?
2 Cor 6:14-18
14 Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
15 And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
16 And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
17 Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,
18 And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
(KJV)
The Catholics must not have consulted this passage when they tried to appease their culture and bring in the pagans by changing the names of things and their symbolism. You do not make contracts with the devil you overcome him by the Word and faith. You offer God’s gift of salvation to the pagans, but you do not pollute the message by trying to mix light and darkness.
Am I being legalistic? 1st Century Christians would have abhorred Christmas because of it’s character as well as the attempt to have concord with Belial. The early church would not even fast on the same day as the pagans because they did not want anyone to think they had anything to do with idolatry. They were free to do so "legally," but chose to limit the freedom they had "under grace" to glorify God. They chose to come out from among the pagans to show that they were different and worshiped the true God. They turned the world upside, had far more zeal and holiness than us and went singing to their deaths in persecution. I believe that our cry of "under grace" is more dereliction of duty, laziness, selfishness and satisfying the flesh more than being free in Christ. (1 Peter 2:16) We want to see how low we can go and still be saved and perish the thought we might ruffle anyone’s feathers. We ignore the Corinthian passage as well.
The very character of Christ Mass would have been anathema to the 1st Century Church.
Heb 9:27-28
27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
28 So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. (KJV)
Heb 6:6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. (KJV)
The very concept of turning the bread and wine into the actual body and blood of Christ is blasphemous and puts Christ to an open shame by crucifying Him again and again so that people can receive grace. He died once and bore the sins of many. Those who look to Him for salvation based upon that one act will see Him appear for them. Indeed, you can only receive grace from that act once because if a person could lose their salvation, they could never be saved again because to be saved again Christ would have to be crucified again since His first sacrifice was obviously insufficient to pay for all of their sins. This is a great argument for eternal security. It also militates against those who think you can lose it and get it again. If you could lose it, you would be lost forever, but praise His name His sacrifice was once and for all and He lives to ever make intercession for us thus saving us to the uttermost that trust in Him! I need no priest, saint or anything else!!! (Heb 7:25)
Many believers were put to death over the centuries for opposing this blasphemy! They would celebrate no mass of any kind!! The Puritans outlawed it, because they knew a mass was mass even Christ Mass. Sadly, many denominations that were founded by men who gave their lives to oppose the mass are heading back to the Catholic Institution that still celebrates the mass as it did centuries ago. They are clueless, but they are fulfilling prophecy. (Rev 17:5) Even a harlot gives birth to a virgin and the child is pure until she chooses to follow her mother’s lifestyle. The virgins have defiled themselves and they are returning to Mom as spiritual harlots. If you belong to one of those groups read the Bible and the writings of your founders rather than your denominational quarterlies. You may be wildly surprised!
If you were born on September 30th, would you want people to send you cards on March 15th just because they wanted to celebrate your birthday then? That would be crazy. However, the date we celebrate Christ’s birthday is not even close. Why, because again the Catholics wanted to bring in some more pagans and they chose one of their holy days, the winter solstice.
Poor scholarship always creates problems and though many of the priests were "doctors of theology" they were not very good at it. If you do a study of the habits of shepherds, seasons in Israel, the orders of the priesthood tracing the priest who was there when Jesus was brought to the temple you will not come anywhere close to December 25th. If we want to celebrate His birthday, why not shoot for something closer in the ballpark rather than use the pagan holiday? We are supposed to be people of truth so why not try to be as accurate as possible? Speaking of that, you need two scenes under your tree if you want to include the wise men. They were not at the manger. They arrived two years later and Jesus was in a house in then. (Matt 2:1-16)
So, if you must celebrate Advent Day or Incarnation Day or whatever else you might call it then let’s do it on Passover since a study was done by a Messianic Rabbi and showed that He was born on March 20th, 6 BC. Celebrating His birth on Passover and deleting Easter would be far more accurate and truly make it His day. Instead of the flurry and financial disaster, why not dedicate the day to Him? Spend some time at a Rescue Mission, a nursing home or do a missions project as a family. Buy something for the homeless or home bound. Have a workday and meal at the Church including the Lord’s Supper at the end of the meal. The possibilities are wide open!
During our current practice, do we help the lonely? Suicide is highest at Christmas partly because we emphasize family so much that those people without families or loved ones stay depressed. There is already some depression that folks go through during winter months due to being housebound and lack of sunshine or whatever and then everywhere they go they are told that only people with families are happy. We need to "adopt" folks and enlarge our families. That would be a great practice for Incarnation Day!
Are parents a failure if they cannot provide gifts? Many people have been laid off recently and unless they bought stuff early or plan to max out their credit cards (not wise) some folks will not be able to provide gifts for their kids. Does this make them failures or lousy parents? No, but they feel that way. Some people will struggle all year long to save up for Christmas presents. They provide all their children’s material needs for the whole year, but if they cannot give Christmas gifts they are very depressed. Does this obsession with a day and the depression come from God? No, it comes from man’s tradition on how to spend Jesus’ "birthday". Some who would never steal will at least consider it so that there are gifts under the tree.
Are we mainly emotional or spiritual? Many folks that run around singing the songs and giving holiday greetings are just doing it from the sheer emotion of the time. They are getting joy from wrapping presents and watching the seasonal programs on TV, but not really giving much thought or time to the "reason for the season." It is just an emotional thing. Two days after they will be back cussing the maniacs on the road not realizing they are one of them. They won’t remember the people they bruised pushing through the crowds elbowing the ones that did not move fast enough. The emotions will be over.
Are presents the premier thing, even to adults? We talked about kids, but what about the adults? Is this just the time you get the wife the fur coat she wants and you get the digital camera you want? Do you emphasize what the person means to you by what you say or do at this time or by the amount of money spent or the size of the gift? Is it really love you are sharing or obligation? Do you want to impress them or the others that might be involved with your celebration?
Finally, when it is over are we spiritually enthused and recharged or emotionally exhausted and overcharged? If it is the latter, we did not celebrate His birthday correctly. We did not receive or welcome Him as He desires. If we truly want to wish Jesus a Happy Birthday then let us give Him gifts of our heart, our, time, our ears, and our lives. Trees and trinkets do not interest Him. Won’t you have a Mary Christmas and find the needful things that will stay with you all year, all decade, and all eternity? Better yet, celebrate Incarnation Day all year long by celebrating His death and resurrection in your life making every day a holy day!! Maranatha!!!
P.S. Jesus may not like it either. Note one of the problems with the Nicolaitans in the paragraph below.
Revelation 2:6 But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
[The deeds of the Nicolaitanes] These were, as is commonly supposed, a sect of
the Gnostics, who taught the most impure doctrines, and followed the most impure practices.
They are also supposed to have derived their origin from Nicolas, one of the seven deacons
mentioned <Acts 6:5>, where see the note. The Nicolaitanes taught the community of wives,
that adultery and fornication were things indifferent, that eating meats offered to idols was quite
lawful; and [mixed several pagan rites with the Christian ceremonies] (emphasis mine). Augustine,
Irenaeus, Clemens Alexandrinus, and Tertullian, have spoken largely concerning them. See more
in my preface to 2nd Peter, where are several particulars concerning these heretics.
(from Adam Clarke Commentary)
