TEN TRUTHS YOU MAY NOT KNOW AND MAY NEVER WANT TO KNOW 10

By Nana Yaw Aidoo

TRUTH 10: Christmas Is Not From God

The word "Christmas" is an Anglo-Saxon word which means "Christ's Mass". It's the time of the year, when some professors of the Christian religion, celebrate the birth of Christ. That this religious ordinance is not from God, is conspicuous by its absence in God's word. We have no direct statement from God to celebrate it religiously, there is no example of the early church celebrating this ordinance and no scripture from which to infer the keeping of this religious ordinance.

The decision to set apart the 25th of December to remember the birth of our Lord, was made by a Catholic bishop by name Liberius, in the year 354 A.D. (Collier's Encyclopedia). This means that the apostles of Christ never oversaw the keeping of this ordinance and therefore it wasn't part of the apostles' doctrine (Acts 2:42). Apparently, this day was a festive day for a certain sun-god and thus it appealed to the Catholics as an appropriate day to celebrate He who is the "Light of the World" (The Lincoln Library of Essential Information as cited by Jarrod Jacobs in "Christmas - Separating Truth From Fiction").

Friends, to claim Christ was born on the 25th of December, is nothing but pure speculation. The closest we get to knowing when Christ was born is from Luke's gospel record. It is written that when Christ was born, "there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night" (Luke 2:8). Christ was born at a time when shepherds could take their sheep out to graze. This is the closest we can get and it certainly doesn't say 25th December. The truth is, we simply don't know.

The fact that God didn't reveal this much, shows that God never wanted us to know, not to talk of even celebrating it religiously in the first place. Moses wrote; "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law" (Deut.29:29). The day Christ was born will continue to remain secret to God, so long as we live this side of eternity.

This doesn't mean Christ should not be remembered. For "His indescribable gift" (2 Cor.9:15) of salvation, to not remember our Lord would be sheer ingratitude. However, remembering Christ is something He has legislated. On the night He was betrayed, He instituted the communion and declared these words; "...do this in remembrance of me" (Luke 22:19). The communion is taken each Lord's day (Acts 20:7) by Christians and when that is done, we "proclaim the Lord's death till He comes" (1 Cor.11:26). To do beyond this is to "think beyond what is written" (1 Cor.4:6).

Some attempt to justify the religious celebration of Christmas by appealing to Romans 14. To use Paul's discussion of matters of indifference to justify the keeping of something that there is no authority to keep religiously, is to pit God against God and apostle against apostle. A cursory reading of the book reveals how the Jew and the Gentile are made to stand in contrast in this book. That was still the case in Romans 14. The Jewish converts to Christianity at a point, struggled to do away with the old law. The apostle Peter struggled initially (Acts 10) and likewise some Christians in Jerusalem. Even though they had come to believe in Christ, they were "all zealous for the law" (Acts 21:20-21).

This proves the progressive nature of revelation. All of God's word was not revealed at once. Later books like Hebrews, set forth the timeless truth that the old law is obsolete (Heb.8:13). However, when the church began, the Jewish converts didn't know. And even when they came to know eventually, some like the Judaizers, simply didn't care. Since the Jewish converts in their old estate, shunned some foods, and kept certain days like the Sabbath, the new moon and the festival days, they were wont to bind these ordinances on the Gentiles. As a result, the Gentiles "despised" the Jews whiles the Jews "judged" the Gentiles as probably heretics (Rom.14:3).

Paul who had a revelation from "the Lord Jesus" understood that "there is nothing unclean of itself" (Rom.14:14). The Jews had been taught that some animals were unclean and likewise those offered to idols. But Paul's statement in the 14th verse, is proof that, the system that taught such things was no longer in existence (cf. Col.2:14-17; 1 Tim.4:1-5). Thus, to eat or not to eat certain foods or to esteem or not to esteem certain "Jewish" days individually, was a matter of indifference (Rom.14:5-6). This text no more authorizes men to of their own accord take a certain day to remember the birth of Christ than it authorizes men to take the Lord's supper on anyday.

Notice that with the Galatians who had been taught the truth on the issue, Paul wrote; "But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage? You observe days and months and seasons and years. I am afraid for you..." (Gal.4:9-11). Thus, the "weak brethren" of Romans 14 were not to remain weak but to move from weakness to strength through teaching. To make Romans 14 teach a religious celebration of Christmas, thereby contradicting this text, is to handle God's word deceitfully (2 Cor.4:2).

There is simply no authority to remember the birth of Christ as a religious ordinance whatsoever. Nonetheless, His birth ought to have meaning to us because there would be no death, burial and resurrection, if Christ had not been born of one who was a virgin (Isa.7:14). However, of a truth, the birth of Christ pales in comparison to His death, burial and resurrection (Rom.1:4; 6:3-17; 1 Cor.15:1-4). It is little wonder our Lord asked us to remember Him at His table, which was designed to remember His death (1 Cor.11:26).

All what we need to be pleasing to God has been revealed to us in His word (2 Tim.3:16-17; 2 Pet.1:3; Jude 3) and whoever walks in the light of God's word, neither adding to it nor taking from it (Rev.22:18-19), "although a fool, shall not go astray" (Isa.35:8).

Let us not make the same mistake that Nadab and Abihu made (Lev.10:1-3). Rather, let us learn to make a distinction between "the holy and the common" (Lev.10:10).

If you didn't know this truth, hopefully you do now.

God bless us all in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.