Rev. David Holwick ZQ
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
December 17, 1995
Isaiah 1:13-16
|
I. The crush of the holiday season.
A. An endless grind?
1) Halloween.
a) Biggest growth, especially for adult parties.
b) Kickoff for Christmas.
2) Thanksgiving.
a) Lots of food and relatives.
3) Christmas.
a) More food, relatives and gift exchanges.
1> Celeste FORCED to go to outlet mall!
b) Many church functions, too.
c) Since it's a religious holiday, the office parties are
the wildest.
4) New Years.
a) More parties where non-Baptists get drunk.
b) Stay up way too late.
B. What do we accomplish by all this?
1) Physically worn out.
a) Hand cramped from Christmas cards.
b) Grossly overweight.
c) Hung over (s?)
2) Massively in debt.
a) We end up paying Mastercard with Visa.
b) One Black pastor has told his congregation to forget
expensive gifts for their kids and put away for their
college.
He has been called the "black Grinch" for his efforts.
But he is right on target!
II. Are holidays necessary?
A. Some groups reject them as unbiblical.
1) Jehovah's Witnesses have no special days, not even
birthdays.
2) Surprisingly, early American Puritans shunned holidays.
a) (Illustration of New England teacher.)
B. Some Christian groups keep them rigidly.
1) Intricate structure of liturgical year.
a) Every day ends up a Saint Day.
b) In some countries, every third day is honored somehow.
c) Different colors of my robe vestment reflect seasons.
2) At least the Biblical themes are highlighted.
C. Others are addicted to sentimentality.
1) A weakness of Baptists.
2) Influenced more by culture than Christian history.
III. Holidays can have a proper place.
A. The Bible has holy days, especially the Old Testament.
1) Sabbath, New Moons, Passover.
2) New Testament adds Lord's Day, Easter.
3) These are days of special devotion to God.
B. Honoring them is optional. Romans 14:5-6
1) Paul says every day is special, because created by God.
2) We can honor all of them, or pick out a few, according to
our personal preference.
3) J.W.'s are only wrong in insisting on their way.
C. Holidays should be holy.
1) God wants obedience more than mark on calendars. Isaiah 1:13-16
a) Like us, they used them as occasions for selfishness.
b) Are your holidays just another day off work?
2) They are pointers to God, not idols. Col 2:16
3) Holidays can turn to legalism. Gal 4:10
IV. Returning to God's perspective.
A. God often left out of our "holy" days.
1) One of biggest times of sin.
2) Even a rabbi says we have lost something in Christmas:
Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman writes in "Cross Currents":
"There is nothing wrong with sleigh bells, Bing Crosby, and
Christmas pudding.
But I should hope Christians would want more than just that.
And as Christmas becomes more and more secularized, I am not sure
they get it.
The real Christmas challenge belongs to Christians: how to take
Christmas out of the secularized public domain and move it back
into the religious sphere once again."
#3432
B. Christmas has not always been the pivot.
1) Originally, Easter is what really mattered.
2) Only in the 1800's, with a push from store owners, did
Christmas take off.
a) Not enough to say "He's the reason for the season."
b) Some Christians argue we should give it to them
completely.
V. What a holiday can be.
A. A time of rest, fellowship, and reflection.
1) Don't over do it.
2) Running hither and thither just wears you out.
a) (memories of lousy Christmases due to greed and
exhaustion)
B. An occasion to jog our memory and teach our kids.
1) Explain to kids what it's all about. Exodus 13:14
2) Spend some time and focus on God.
C. We don't need Christmas spirit, but Christ's Spirit.
1) Warm, fuzzy feelings WON'T solve world's problems.
2) We don't need fuzzy feeling, but new birth.
3) If Christ isn't in our heart, we cannot really honor
Christmas.
D. The secret of Christmas is in the miracle.
About 20 years ago a newspaper in western Canada, the Edmonton
Journal, launched a crusade to rid the city of the blight of
Christmas.
It didn't take. Ted Byfield wrote about their effort:
"The Edmonton Journal has failed.
Despite this odd challenge, the festive occasion remains what
it always was in the capital of Alberta -
- outrageous to the pure liberal,
disgusting to the pure spiritualist,
abominable to the pure Marxist,
and inexorable to the purely common man."
Humanism fails to fulfill, therefore we make a very poor god.
But if man cannot worship himself because he is too close to
the subject and knows it for what it is,
And yet cannot worship God either because God is too far away
and he knows not what God is, then what can man worship?
Behind the tinsel of Christmas lies an astonishing answer.
God has become man.
He has shouldered the human burden, played the human game to its
bitterest possible end, and emerged triumphant.
In Him, therefore, every human finds his purpose, every life its
fulfillment, every soul its God.
That is Christmas. It is lethal stuff.
No wonder they wanted to abolish it."
#605
Copyright © 2024 by Rev. David Holwick
Created with the Freeware Edition of HelpNDoc: Easily create CHM Help documents