Merry Christmas (whether you like it or not)

(If you have known me for more than one Christmas season, you've probably heard me pushing this song as one of the greatest Christmas messages of all time. I still stick by it, and I'd still heartily recommend you listen to it, especially if you want to get into some of the same headspace I was in while writing this post. The lyrics may be found here.)

It's Christmas.

In Las Vegas, Nevada, the Freedom From Religion Foundation has purchased several billboards with messages such as "Heathen's Greetings," "Reason's Greetings," and "Yes, Virginia... There Is No God." (More info on that here. Please accept my sincerest apologies - both women make me mad to no end.)

In malls across America, people are maxing out their credit cards and depleting their savings accounts in attempts to buy happiness for themselves and their loved ones.

I have absolutely no money, and even though I know my family knows that, I still feel the incredible pressure of trying to put together a gift for everybody, even though I know that they are happy just to have me around for the holidays. And yet, at the exact same time, my impatient materialistic side is still twitching nervously, wondering what I'll get this year. I've got far, far, far more than I could ever need, but I still don't have everything I want, and I somehow think that to be sufficient grounds for complaint.

And finally, perhaps most bafflingly of all, I've got atheist friends and Christian friends alike complaining about the "Christianization" of a pagan holiday, the winter solstice festival, into a supposed remembrance of the birth of Christ.

I think that to recognize that "Christmas" is not originally a Christian holiday is good, but I think that to intentionally divorce any Christian purpose from Christmas is a mistake.

Whether Christ was born on the 25th of December or not doesn't matter.

What matters is that we come together on one of the coldest, darkest days of the year and share in each other's love and presence*.

God called Abram out of Ur in Babylon, and used the systems Abram already understood from his pagan worldview (such as circumcision and sacrifices) to transform him into Abraham, a man with a new worldview, one centered on the true God. There are aspects of Babylonian culture all across early Israelite culture. The entire book of Deuteronomy is modeled after a Babylonian treaty form.

But God can still use those pagan ideas to show us something holy.

And I think that is EXACTLY what can happen with Christmas, if we let it.

If we choose to focus on the fact that our modern Christmas descends from a pagan seasonal festival, then of course it's hard to find the Baby in the manger fitting in naturally.

But if we choose to focus on the celebration of the birth of the Child, no matter what day of the year it really was, and use that celebration as a time to rekindle the flames of family and friendship, especially in the hardest, loneliest, dreariest, coldest part of the year, then it can become quite natural to see Christmas as a holy thing. And not just natural - but good.

God is not unwilling to meet us where we are. He met earlier Christians in the snowy fields of Europe, gathered around their Yule logs, and helped them tie their Winter Solstice celebrations to His Son.

And so He still can - and, if we allow Him, will - meet us, here and now, with our stress, traffic jams, and shopping lists, and He will transform us into the people we were meant to be, celebrating the birth and life of His Son all year long, but taking a special day in the middle of the cold and the dark to show the rest of the world His Face.

Merry Christmas.

* - You see what I did there? With the "presence" bit? Huh? Christmas? "Presence"? "Presents"? Yeah? Get it?