Should we celebrate Christmas ??

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December 04, 2012

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Most Christians around the globe observe December 25 as a holiday to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ. (Of course, even many non-Christians now celebrate this festival with gift giving and social gatherings.) Yet the exact date of Jesus’ birth is unknown, and as the origins of Christmas understood by most people are being called into question, some are beginning to wonder if Christians should participate in the many customs surrounding this most popular holiday in the Western world?

First, it is clear that the Bible does not contain a command to keep Christmas as a sacred day, such as with the Sabbath in the Ten Commandments. There is no Scripture saying, “Thou shalt keep the 25th of December holy.” While it might be a public holiday, it is not a biblical holy day.

What about the origins of Christmas? Concerns about pagan elements in this holiday are nothing new. Controversies over Christmas go back hundreds of years. The Puritans in England actually led the English Parliament to ban Christmas for a period of time as a “popish festival with no biblical justification” and a time of wasteful and immoral behavior. Even in Colonial America there was a time (1659) when Christmas was outlawed. More recently, secular elements of society have faced off with religious groups over nativity scenes and crosses on public property.

The Bible certainly highlights the birth of Christ (Luke 2:7). It not only describes the glorious announcement of the Messiah’s birth (v. 13) but also tells of shepherds coming to worship the newborn child (v. 16). These humble worshippers were not quiet about what they saw either (v. 17). Furthermore, there is a record of wise men from the east bringing gifts to Jesus—though this likely occurred when Jesus was a toddler (Matthew 2:11). If people recognized the birth of Christ through worship and bringing gifts, perhaps there is something we can learn from their examples.

Aside from its pagan elements, most people understand that Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus. But in practice, people spend more time in December cruising shopping malls than studying the life of the Savior. Frosty the Snowman and Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer compete with wise men and shepherds for our attention. During all the bustle between “Black Friday” and Christmas Eve, materialism tends to overshadow the simple stable.

But what if Christians spent more time witnessing for Christ at Christmas or purchasing and sharing Christians resources to point people to Jesus? What would happen if more families dedicated time and money to serve the poor and advance the gospel through short-term mission service? How would our churches be strengthened if, during this holiday time, believers explored the prophecies of Christ’s first advent as well as His second advent? Perhaps our concerns about Christmas should have less to do with its pagan origins and more with its current practice.

Many people might deny they “worship” this day as holy, but what is worship? Worship isn’t measured by simply attending a Christmas concert or midnight mass. It describes how we live our lives and spend our means. As Paul said, "He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord" (Romans 14:6), and, “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31).

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adapted from Af.

Courtesy of Amazing facts Inc.
©2008-2016 Present Truth Messengers Ministry.

Chistmas in Chistian church

BUT HOW DID CHRISTMAS GET INTO THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH?
The day for this worship had been selected in honor of Mithra, the sun god. December 25 was dedicated to the keeping
of his birthday. Therefore sincere Christians considered it to be a form of sun worship. The sun had reached its lowest angle in the sky on December 21 (the winter solstice), and the 25th was the first observable day in which it began rising in the noon sky. So December 25 had, for centuries, been celebrated as the “birth of the sun god.” But, back in those earlier centuries, earnest believers recognized that Christians dare not accept pagan practices or pagan holidays. These heathen customs are not found in the Bible as being used by Christians, so they ought to be shunned by conscientious Christians.
“A feast was established in memory of this event [Christ’s birth] in the fourth century. In the fifth century the Western Church ordered it to be celebrated forever on the day of the old Roman feast of the birth
of Sol [the Latin word for ‘sun’], as no certain knowledge of the day of Christ’s birth existed.”—Encyclopedia Americana (1944 edition), “Christmas.”

Birth of sun god

IT WAS THE BIRTHDAY OF THE SUN GOD
“One of the dominant religious ideas of the second and third
centuries was the belief in the divinity of the Sun . . “This divinity is of especial interest for our inquiry, for his annual festival fell on the twenty-fifth of December and its relation to Christmas [p. 151] has been a matter of protracted discussion. Obviously the season of the winter solstice, when the strength of the sun begins to increase, is appropriate for the celebration of the festival of a sun-god. The day in a sense marks the birth of a new sun. But the reason for its being chosen as the day for the commemoration of Christ’s nativity is not so evident.
“ . . The identity of date is more than a coincidence. To be sure the Church did not merely appropriate the festival of the popular sun-god. It was through a parallelism between Christ and the sun that the twenty-fifth of December came to be the date of the nativity . . [p.153] Even Epiphanius, the fourth century metropolitan of Cyprus, though giving the sixth of January as the date of birth, connects the event with the solstice. Moreover, the diversion of the significance of a popular pagan holiday was wholly in accord with the policy of the Church. Of the actual celebration of a festival of the nativity, it should be added, there is no satisfactory evidence earlier than the fourth century. Its first observance in Rome on December the twenty-fifth took place in 353 or 354 (Usener) or in 336 (Duchesne). In Constantinople it seems to have been introduced in 377 or 378.”—Gordon J. Laing, Survivals of Roman Religion (New York: Longmans, 1931), 150-153.

Chrismas truth.

So I'm asking you to lay aside cultural prejudices and preferences, and approach this question with an open mind. Granted, that can be hard to do but it isn’t impossible. We are so snowed under a century of tradition and nostalgia that it's almost impossible for some people to look at the issue objectively at all. I'm asking you to put aside your preconceived notions, at least temporarily, to look honestly at the institution called Christmas.
To begin, there is no indication in the New Testament that the early Christians observed Christmas at all. You cannot find the exact day of Christ’s birth anywhere recorded in Scripture, let alone the celebration of it. In fact, it can be demonstrated in church history that, for probably the first 300 years after the birth of Christ, Christians knew nothing of a Christmas celebration.
Frederick Neilsen, a Danish bishop, says, "During the first three centuries we find no trace of any feast for the birth of Christ."-- Ecclesiastical History, page 224.
Lector P. Walsdenstrom says: "The custom to celebrate the birth of Christ in the last part of December began first in the fourth century."-- Notes to Luke 2:8.

THE PAGAN WORSHIPERS OF MITHRA CELEBRATED THE BIRTHDAY OF THE SUN ON DECEMBER 25

THE PAGAN WORSHIPERS OF MITHRA CELEBRATED THE BIRTHDAY OF THE SUN ON DECEMBER 25
“Each day in the week, the planet to which the day was sacred was invoked in a fixed spot in the crypt; and Sunday, over which the Sun presided, was especially holy . .
“The rites which they [the Mithraists] practised offered numerous analogies . . They also held Sunday sacred, and celebrated the birth of the Sun [god] on the 25th of December.”—Franz Cumont, the Mysteries of Mithra, Trans. by T.J. McCormack, 167, 191.