If for some crazy reason you happen to be surfing the internet the day before or the day of Christmas (I know who would do such a thing?), and you happen upon Rural American Pastor, then allow me to wish you a very Merry Christmas!  Especially if you are an attender at Little Mountain, then Merry Christmas to you and I love you all.  I look forward to seeing you Wednesday night or Sunday!  Have fun with your families and remember the Gospel is the center of Christmas, not just the birth, but also the life, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior.  Now get off the internet and go spend time with your family!

We often hear about how Christ is removed from Christmas increasingly more in our culture.  This is no doubt true in many ways.  A presidential candidate recently came under intense fire for being so bold as to say “Merry Christmas” in a television spot.  This is true in many spheres of our culture.  Christmas has become secularized, consumerized, and many other interesting -izes.  From time to time we here that one example of Christ being removed from Christmas comes in the form of signs that replace Christ with X rendering it “Have a Merry XMAS.”  This is pointed to as a gross removal of the true meaning of the season.  But is it?  No doubt some see it this way and in our day and age it likely has that intent behind it for many.  It is less blatant.  More politically correct perhaps?  But not originally.  We write many things in shorthand.  That’s a way of making it easier for us to write out words, less time consuming, page space saving, etc.  Originally, in a place like the Roman Empire where the name Christ began to become a real life hazard for His early followers, a natural shorthand, or code word was used in place of Christ.  Essentially the “X” means Christ.  If I could write in Greek, Christ is spelled XRISTOS.  Much like the fish symbol so popular today that was also used in early Christianity as an acronym for Jesus, the “X” would have had a clear meaning to other Christians that the pagans would not have understood.  ”X” is just a letter to them, but to His followers it meant Christ.  If you could write XRISTOS and be fodder for the lions in the Coliseum, or you could write “X” and other Christians know what you mean, but the rest would not, which would you write?  It’s not an easy answer is it?  We face nowhere near the level of persecution those in the early church faced.  Were we faced with the same level even as the modern church in China our tunes might be different.  So when you see “Merry XMAS” on a sign somewhere this season, be discerning in your judgments.  It may be a harmless shorthand for Christ, or it may be an attempt at taking Christ out of Christmas.  Let the ones try who would try to remove Him.  They can’t succeed.  Pray for them instead, that’s what Jesus would do (Hey, there’s another popular acronym).  

Every Wednesday night our church participates in what we call “A Deeper Look.”  It’s an opportunity for us to examine a topic, a Scriptural passage, a verse, or a congregational question in more depth than we’d have the opportunity to do on an average Sunday worship service.  Tonight we’ll be taking a look at the history behind many of our every year Christmas traditions.  Unfortunately there are dozens of traditions we won’t have time to cover, but there are a few important ones that we will.  We’ll look at the December 25th traditional date for the observation of Christmas.  Why do we celebrate it then?  Come find out.  What about Christmas trees?  Anything in the Bible about Christmas trees?  Well, no, but they’re fun, and we’ll see where they come from.  Along with the trees we’ll examine the lights and decorations and why we do that.  In addition, we’ll finish off with the jolly man in the red suit.  Yes, Santa, the kind-hearted saint that flew into Bethlehem on December 25th, just in time to catch the birth of Jesus.  Not sure about that one?  That’s b/c obviously that’s not where Santa originated.  Want to know the truth?  Come find out.  It’s gonna be informative, fun, and enlightening, and you will DEFINITELY learn something you didn’t know before.  Join us at 7:00 for A Deeper Look at Christmas Tradition

When I was a kid (we still do this every year), we’d go to my grandparents on Christmas Eve.  It was a HUGE gathering of family from Mema and Papa, Mom and Dad, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Brother, Sister, and the Greats (aunt and uncle).  We’d always eat supper first which made the kids CRAZY b/c we were ready to get to the presents, and they’d always have to clean up after supper before the presents.  That is all a story in itself, but this post is about the ride home.  The ride home from my grandparents was one of the most magical moments in the history of my childhood.  It was usually very late by a child’s standards, 11 or 11:30 at night, and it was always cold and dark.  As we rode we listened to Christmas music on the radio and me, my brother, and my sister (both younger) would look out the window the whole ride home watching for Santa and his sleigh.  Some nights we saw nothing, and others we were quite sure we caught a glimpse of the jolly fat man in the red suit.  The build up on the way home was intense.  See my parents would sneak off at some point in the day on Christmas Eve and set up the house like Santa had been there already.  It was somehow so believable then.  We felt like the luckiest kids on earth b/c we knew he’d come to our house as one of the first.  As we pulled in, my parents would get the camera and GIGANTIC camcorder out, asking all the while, “You think he’s already come?”  We’d excitedly get out of the car and for some reason nervously make our way to the door.  Then the moment would hit.  We opened the front door, turned the lights on, and there it’d all be, laid out across the den waiting on us.  But even though I don’t always remember each year what we walked in to, I’ll never forget the 25 minute ride home that always seemed like an eternity.  Do you have Christmas memories like that?