Pre-Christmas Thoughts

Before the end of the year, I wanted to put a short blog out just to celebrate the time and signal that I’m still writing here at Plowboy Theology. A Christian blog is obligated to write something for Christmas to show they’re likewise celebrating the most wonderful time of the year, and despite my absence from writing the last several months, I wanted to end the year off with just a short blog to share some thoughts with you.

It’s funny how Christmas, truly being the most joyous time of year, keeps its joy through the stress of it all. Traffic is terrible, packages don't arrive on time, maintaining a schedule as to be sure to visit all of the family possible. Christmas is demanding. Even as I fit in the time to write this short blog, there's work to be done. Even as I write this, drinking my morning cup of coffee and continually peeking over to check on a 5 month old switching between toys in her play pen before going to work, it's busy. It's a beautiful, hectic, and rewarding time of the year. And I wanted just say a few things before the close of the year.

This Christmas, Be Thankful.

"Obviously," you say, half rolling your eyes at the generic advice. But what I'm talking about is a more practical aspect. We all know that person, or are that person, when asked what they would like for Christmas, "I don't want anything. Spend that money on yourself." Such a response is as unhelpful as (insert whatever you think of as most unhelpful).

And sometimes, those responses can be quite vicious, even while celebrating the most happy time of year. "Merry Christmas, and if you buy me anything, I'll kill ya..."

Most of us know the feeling of buying someone the perfect gift. We don't always do it, but every once in a while, we just crush it. The recipient wasn't expecting it, yet it was just what they wanted. Those feelings are awesome because there's a joy in giving. It feels good to give gifts. It pleases the Father to give His children gifts (Matt 7:11).

When people demand not to be given anything for Christmas, they genuinely want the other person to save your money and not spend it buying something they don't need. But the reality of it is, they're robbing that person of the joy of giving. Giving is a good thing. Giving is a biblical thing. Paul says in regards to giving to the church that God loves a cheerful giver.

This Christmas, don't be the person that people are nervous giving to. Nervous about hearing your "I wish you wouldn't have gotten me anything!" speech that you give every year, or nervous about the hateful looks you'll cut at the sight of a gift addressed to you. Smile and be grateful. It was a joy for them to do it.

With that being said, it's also possible to get a little ahead of ourselves while Christmas shopping, that is, going beyond what we can really afford. Motivations aren't always sinful, though they can be. And for the next few months of the new year, we work to payoff our credit card bills for Christmas.

Putting yourself or your family in a financial crisis during the holiday season is not how to have a joyful Christmas. And God forbid those expenditures be done in competition with outdoing other family members. It's like taking out a loan or using a credit card to give your tithe. You're not giving, you're borrowing. Some self-control is necessary to have a happy Christmas. Let the pagans make Christmas the most materialistic time of the year. Let us enjoy the time with family, affordable gift giving, and celebrating the birth of our Lord. A little more on that at the end.

Now, time for a little controversy (after all, it wouldn't be a Plowboy Theology without it, would it?)

Some Thoughts on Santa

"Oh boy," you say, "time for a fundamentalist rant..." Well, I've definitely heard those before. But I just want to give you something to think about. It's a little late in the Christmas season to change things now, but hear me out.

When my wife and I were dating, we both wanted to do the Santa routine with our future children. But before we got married, without really talking about it in much detail, we both had decided we did not want to do Santa anymore.

I've asked young parents of small children if they plan to do Santa with their children and have gotten some very straightforward responses. They almost get angry at the thought of not doing Santa Claus, as though it violated their Christian conviction. "Yes....." they exclaim in frustration.

"Okay," I'd respond because I really don't care that much. "I don't think we will. We'd rather just focus on Jesus with our children."

"Oh, well yeah," they answer back. "We'll do both."

I'd nod as though that answer made sense, celebrating in tandem both the living God and Savior of the world alongside a fictional character that frankly, many parents try harder to convince their children of than they do Jesus. You don't typically hear "Jesus is watching you" throughout the year. But during December, you'll hear the frustrated parent tell their clearly coal deserving child that Santa is watching them while at the mall shopping for their presents.

One of the main reasons I didn't want to try to convince my children of Santa Claus, apart from the purposeful deception, was just some of the bizarre things I'd picked up on about Santa during the Christmas season.

My favorite childhood Christmas movie was/is A Year Without a Santa Claus. But in my older age, it weirded me out a little at the extreme attempts to convince children of Santa. In the movie, Santa sits at the kitchen table with a child singing "wipe that question from your mind, yes he does exist. Just like love, I know he's there, waiting to be missed."

Or even the Here Comes Santa Claus song that plays on repeat during December, "he doesn't care if you're rich or poor, he loves you just the same. Santa knows we're all God's children, that makes everything right. So let's give thanks to the Lord above, cause Santa Claus comes tonight." It's like a hymn...

The part that turned me off the most was the attempt to make Santa like God or some sort of ambassador of God. Not only will he bring you presents, but he loves you.

Just as a quick side note because it irritates me and you'd expect it from me: if Santa believes we're all, every single person in the world, adopted children of God, then Santa is a heretic. And the real, historical St. Nicholas punched heretics (see my blog Plowboy Theology). If the real St. Nicholas knew how his image was being portrayed some 1700 years later, he'd still be rolling heads.

And consider this, your children see Santa perform incredible works that they don't even see God do. They have more evidence to believe in Santa than they do God. Let me give you an example.

I heard a Cuban refugee tell of his time under the dictatorship of Fidel Castro. Soldiers came into his elementary school class and told all of the children to close their eyes and pray to Jesus that He would give them candy. When they opened their eyes, there wasn't any candy. Then, the soldiers told them to close their eyes and pray to Castro that he would give them candy, and when they opened their eyes, there was candy on their desks.

That should chill you knowing the judgment those men would suffer and break your hearts for the children who were manipulated that way. Hopefully you pray with your children every night, and they probably don't see those prayers fulfilled every time. But at the end of the year, they can ask someone else for whatever they want and you will see that it is fulfilled. Not only that, they leave cookies out at night. And when they wake up, they're gone. They don't see God work in such incredible ways, but they see overwhelming evidence of a fictional character's existence.

This is the only time of year apart from Easter when believers and non-believers celebrate Jesus together. Yet, in a lot of Christian families, the first thing on their children's mind when they wake up on Christmas morning is that Santa came. Throughout the day, family ask them what Santa brought them. The day is about Santa, and by the way, happy birthday Jesus.

Why do we, as Christians, not take advantage of this gospel opportunity? There is a lot of outrage now about wokeness and the attempt to manipulate children. Drag Queen Story Hour, sex ed at disgustingly young ages, gender reassignment and hormone blockers. It's an outrage because children are impressionable. They're easily manipulated. They believe you when you tell them they're not really a boy but a girl. And they believe you when you say Santa is real and they must believe in him to receive presents. Why in the world aren't we taking advantage of this easily persuaded time of their life and teaching them truth?

Listen, moms and dads, your kid is a filthy, degenerate, law-breaking sinner. David said he was a sinner at the moment of his conception (Psalm 51:5). I have an extraordinarily sweet 5 month old, but she is not free of the binding chains of her depravity.

They. Cannot. Make. The. Nice. List....

They. Cannot. Make. The. Nice. List....

They. Cannot. Make. The. Nice. List....

You cannot spend 11 months out of the year communicating their sin to them, pointing to the blood-stained cross where the Son of God bore their iniquity and pleading that they repent and ask forgiveness for their damning sin, then in the final month of the year tell them, if they're good, they can make the nice list and get presents. Then put out presents on Christmas Eve night to prove to them they were good boys and girls.

The point of Christmas is that hell-bound people who could never do good received the Son of God on earth, where He would live a perfect life of righteousness, die for sin, forgive our sin, and cleanse vile, naughty people of their transgressions. The message of a Christian Christmas is not doing good and being rewarded, but being bad by virtue and being forgiven for it. Christmas is about grace, not reward. Playing along with the Santa routine every year with your kids is anti-gospel. Don't play mind games about their sin nature then prove they can be good enough to earn gifts.

If you want to buy Santa decorations and watch Santa movies with your kids, that's fine. We took our 5 month old daughter to get her picture taken with Santa this year. The difference is I don't try to convince her that Santa is real and will bring her presents for good behavior. That guy dressed as Santa is a friend and former co-worker of her dad. We can enjoy the nostalgic and traditional practices of Christmas that aren't Biblical such as Christmas trees and lights and even Santa. A lot of people have Grinch decorations throughout their house and even take their kids to see the Grinch, and children are fully aware that he is a fictional character. It's still fun without the deception. They can enjoy the idea of Santa without believing he's real.

The Birth of Christ

During this time of the year, it's not uncommon to hear people say, "well, Christmas is just a pagan holiday that Christians made into their own holiday. That's not even when Jesus was born." That's true. Thanksgiving is the only Christian founded holiday with no pagan roots. And yes, we're well aware that December 25th is not the actual birthdate of Jesus. And I like to give a meaningful, thought-out response to those who raise such criticism: "Yeah, who cares?"

Most aren't even aware of the pagan roots of Christmas, nor know what aspects of Christmas derive themselves from paganism. That's because Christianity took over the holiday. Most think of it as strictly a Christian holiday. These are the lyrics to a version of Carol of the Bells that plays every year on secular music stations:

Ring, Christmas Bells, Merrily ring,

Tell all the world: Jesus is King!

Loudly proclaim with one accord,

The happy tale; Welcome the Lord

Ring, Christmas Bells, Sound far and near,

The birth day of Jesus is here.

Ring, Christmas bells, Throughout the earth

Tell the glad news, Of Jesus birth.

Loudly proclaim With one accord,

The happy tale; Welcome the Lord.

It's a time of the year when even non-believers celebrate the birth of Jesus. But it's more than that. R.C. Sproul stated, "What we celebrate at Christmas is not so much the birth of a baby, but the incarnation of God Himself." The birth of Jesus is not when Jesus came into existence. He had been with the Father since before creation, exercising His rule and authority as God in the act of creating all things (John 1:1). Jesus tells the Jewish unbelievers who criticize His knowledge of Abraham, "before Abraham was, I AM." (John 8:58). "I AM" being derived from God's personal name: Yahweh. Not only was He saying He had always been, but He was claiming to be Yahweh.

Christmas is not recognizing when Jesus began to exist, but celebrating the point in history when God became man. When God left His heavenly abode, humbled Himself, and came to earth to live as a human, from infancy to adulthood. It's more than just the birth, it's the incarnation. When God became like as we are, yet without sin.

A lot more can and will be said on this topic later as we progress through our study of systematic theology and finish up Bibliology at the beginning of the new year.

Don't just go through the motions of another Christmas this year. Enjoy the gifts, don't make the holiday about someone or something else, spend time with family, give what you can afford, and keep at the center focus the incarnation of Jesus Christ.

And for goodness sakes, go to church this Christmas Sunday!