Last Wednesday, we had a free breakfast bonanza at my working place to celebrate the coming of “holidays”. Nowadays, corporations do not want to mention “Christmas” anymore.  The cafeteria was filled with people who took advantage of this free offer. While I was there, I overheard one of the cafeteria clerks said, “I have never seen so many people in the cafeteria this year”.  Yes, it was quite a scene to see so many people around. But this is just an exceptional case.

This lets me think of a drastically different scene from 2000 years ago. When God decided to give us the greatest “free” gift – His only begotten son Jesus Christ, what was mankind’s reaction? I know for sure He is not as welcomed as the free breakfast we just had. Isn’t this ironic? As we recall from the Scripture (Luke 2), Jesus was born in a manger at a small town called Bethlehem because there was no guest room for Him. And, there is neither a “welcome party” nor a “baby shower” being held later to celebrate His birth except shepherds in the field came to receive Him.

The sad part in our society is, 2000 years later, most of people celebrate holidays do not even know what is the reason for; because schools, corporations, public institutions and governments are not allowed to teach or to indicate the true meaning of celebration anymore. The celebration therefore becomes commercialized and has lost its meaning in the middle of shopping frenzy. Richard De Haan, President of RBC Ministries, wrote a very enlightening story about the phenomenon of trying to ignore the true meaning intentionally. He wrote,

Two women who were dressed in their finest were having lunch together in a very exclusive restaurant. A friend saw them and came over to their table to greet them. “What’s the special occasion?” she asked. One of the women said, “We’re having a birthday party for the baby in our family. He’s 2 years old today.” “But, where’s the baby?” the friend asked. The child’s mother answered, “Oh, I dropped him off at my mother’s house. She’s taking care of him until the party’s over. It wouldn’t have been any fun with him along.”

Isn’t this very ridiculous to celebrate a birthday without the birthday baby?  As this phenomenon has become more and more acceptable today because of the consideration and tolerance against others that we were asked to do, the recognition and acknowledgement of the true meaning of celebration would become more and more blurry in our minds. There is a serious warning, however, in the book of 1 John that we should remember:

No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also. 凡不認子的就沒有父．認子的連父也有了。(1 John 2:23)

May God help this country to recognize the true meaning of Christmas and may our Lord be exalted by all nations!