December 12, 2003

          For the last nine or ten years my wife and I with our three young children have made a tradition of driving around Gallipolis and the surrounding areas to look at Christmas lights.  As we point out lights, cries of “Ooo!”, “Ahh!” and “Wow!” reverberate from the back of our van.  Even those things that seem normally mundane earn special appreciation.  After seeing an unusually spectacular decoration, we have found ourselves saying to our youngest child, “Wow!  That is a pretty one.  Oops!  That was actually just a traffic light.”  You know, sometimes it is hard to break momentum.

          Be that as it may, it is definitely the Christmas season:  the season of hope, the season of joy, the season of giving.

          “Giving.”  That is a nice thought.  Oops!  That should actually be “receiving.”  But before anyone jumps on my case for defying one of our favorite Christmas sayings, “Christmas is the season for giving,” let me explain myself.

          It is a noble thing to give, of course – especially out of one’s poverty, but consider that the great point of Christmas is not what you give – it is what you get.

          Of course, I do not mean what you get under your Christmas tree.  No, no.  I am talking about God’s great objective in Christmas or rather what His plan was in sending His Son to Earth in the first place.

          Honestly, are you in your heart where you want to be in celebrating Christmas this year?  Or are you instead caught up in the madness of Christmas shopping and other busy things that have quickly become the focus of the holidays?

          Shopping for Christmas in particular is not so much a jubilant expression of love and appreciation for the birth of the Savior.  For so many of us, it has instead become a duty, a chore, a tedious exercise in trying to make someone else happy.  And Christmas cards!  The mountain of Christmas cards to go out each year is like an avalanche waiting to happen for the hapless soul sitting in its shadow!  Christmas becomes too easily a season of pressure and stress!

          But God does not intend that for us in our relationship with Him!  He desires instead for us a release from this kind of bondage (see Luke 4:17-21).  He much prefers a season of real joy and celebration of His love for us than our excessive busy-ness!

          But how does a person “shift” from the obsessive-compulsive hustle and bustle of our world to this new way of thinking and living out our relationship with Him?  First, by simply shifting one’s emphasis from the craze this season has become to God’s purpose in sending Christ that first Christmas so long ago.  And what was that purpose?  His purpose was (and is) to rain down His gifts upon us – the first and most special of all being wrapped in human flesh and placed under a shining star that He Himself put in the sky.  “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son…” (John 3:16).

          Does it make sense then that I say “Tis the season for receiving”?  The Bible has a lot to say on the great gifts of God.  It says in John 1:12 that “To all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God”.  In Romans 6:23, “…The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”  And it says in 2 Peter 1:3-4, “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of Him Who called us by His own glory and goodness.  Through these He has given us very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”

          Just think!  Through Christ He gives us the right to become His children!  He gives us eternal life!  He gives us all that we need for an abundant, joy-filled life if we will only stop running, learn the receiving and practice the resting.  And, if we finally come to the place where we really learn how to “receive” God’s love, our giving suddenly becomes empowered as well.  After all, “We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

          But be warned.  It is not easy to leave the hurrying behind to enter that kind of spiritual rest in God.  You know, sometimes it really is hard to break momentum!

(Thom Mollohan has ministered in southern Ohio the past eight years, is currently the pastor of Pathway Community Church.   He and his wife are the parents of three children.   He may be reached by email at pastorthom@pathwaygallipolis.com).