With Christmas safely in the rearview mirror, an unsettling thought has….settled upon me.
Please don't write me off as a Christmas-hater…a sort of evangelical Ebenezer Scrooge. But as I look back upon our celebration of Christ's birth, I'm concerned.
Let me express it in a sentence. As a Christian culture, it seems to me we have made so much out of having a Merry Christmas, we've forgotten that merriment was surely not the only thing on God's mind as that first Christmas story unfolded.
The same passage in Isaiah 9 that brings us a picture of Jesus as the "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God and Everlasting Father" speaks of a burden, an oppressor. Verse five speaks of battles, blood and burning.
What I'm saying is, there's a place–or there ought to be–for the sober side of the season. There's no point to the crèche…apart from the cross. We must not disconnect the fact that Messiah was laid in a manger ONLY so that He might someday lay down his life.
And maybe I'm wrong, but it feels to me like this gets only cursory treatment in modern celebrations.
Of course we should sing "Hark the Herald Angels Sing." Of course we should celebrate Joy to the World. But we must also leave room for the grim reality that sin was why Jesus came.
I think of Colossians 1:13… For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,
Battles and blood and hostages…share an equal–if not larger–part in the story. They're…really not fun to sing about. And how do you decorate a church with images of hostages?
Yet….to be faithful to the real story of Christmas, we cannot ignore the dark side. The sin.
All I'm saying is, maybe it's time to check our balance. Merriment at Christmas is well and good and proper. But not if we leave little or no room for pondering the darkness.