Christmas Thoughts

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… It’s that time of year again—everywhere you go you are reminded (in case you somehow forgot) it’s Christmas. I love the Christmas season. I love the festivity, cheer, tradition, and family bond that it brings. Most of all, I love the true meaning of Christmas, Christ, or Emmanuel, meaning God with us! To think that for a small season of the year this world stops to recognize the highest name on earth, Jesus!

One of the things that amazes me the most about Christmas is how consumed our society becomes with it. Christmas becomes part of everything we do in December. Everywhere you go is decorated for Christmas; even the hot pads in the kitchen get switched out for Christmas ones. We wear Christmas sweaters and Santa hats. There is Christmas candy and special Christmastime meals. The radio stations and stores will switch over to Christmas music and the T.V. will be playing Christmas movies. Even the stoplights will blink a bright red and green (couldn’t resit that one). This time of year we are consumed with everything Christmas.

I love Christmas! But I had this thought, what if the Christian could get as consumed with God and Christianity as our society is with Christmas? It would change our world if we did. If the Christian was as consumed with God as society is with Christmas, it would affect what we wear and where we go. It would change our music and our movie choices. God would become the driving force behind everything we do!

In Deuteronomy 6:5-9 God tells His people, “And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.” I believe you could sum these verse up with the word “consumed.” God wants His people to be consumed with Him.

When someone is consumed with something it changes everything about them. It affects every area of their life. When someone is consumed with something it is impossible for them to hide it. That thing that consumes them shows up and comes out in everything they do. When someone is consumed with something it is contagious; it spreads to others around them. Imagine the difference we could make in our world for God if we became consumed with God!

Christian, as you enjoy this Christmas season with family and friends, let it serve as a reminder that just as Christmas has worked it’s way into every part of our life this time our year, God should be part of everything we do and everything we are.