Here it is mid-November and everyone is looking toward Thanksgiving and Christmas. Another year has come and gone and I am sure that many, many, things have changed along the way. Some family members have come along and some have passed away; many have been separated from their loved ones (military wise).
And there has been anxiety and fear, happiness and joy and some sadness. This is the life we all must deal with and yet there is always a silver lining in every situation. It is a comfort when we know the Lord Jesus Christ is standing with us, providing the needed shoulder to both laugh and cry on.
I believe in my heart it is a good thing that we have Thanksgiving. We need to be thankful every day for all of the blessings the Lord gives us, whether one is saved to Jesus Christ or not. The Bible is evidence to this fact in many areas, so I chose the Scripture that, sticks closest to my heart:
Matthew 5:45: “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.”
I am a simple man and I love the same passages of Scripture that my parents loved. Thus my choice of what the passage above is saying; that the Lord God shows HIS love to everyone without regard to their connection to HIM or not. How great a love is it when HE loves everyone enough to bless everyone and does so all the time; think in terms of your next breath of air, it’s always there. In the Lords heart, He is saying, “I created you and I love you, let me bless you and show you how much!”
I don’t care who you are or what you believe, you can’t lay any blame of HIM for loving you as much as HE does and then proves it. That is the best way of telling us to be “Christ-like.” That we should not only love those who are in our families, but to love our enemies as well, to do good to those who despise us and to pray for those who despitefully use us. Again I am going to say, the Lord God shows us how we should live every day by what HE does every day
Matthew 7:11-12: “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.”
Showing us this perfect example of love to others, is what we should be every day of every year we live. I cannot denounce the idea enough of “Live and let live.” Simply put, that does not fit the bill for anyone. It is the equivalent of saying, “You do your thing and stay out of mine!” How does that work for the betterment of all? It doesn’t, because it negates our responsibility for reaching everyone for Jesus Christ.
Or maybe you do not understand the “Great Commission” in God’s Word. It literally tells us that we are a society of people, not singular individuals, that truly matter. It is true, that the Lord wants a one-on-one relationship with each of us, but more than just that—HE wants us to become HIS family as a group, as nations of people, bound together in real love for one another.
Or maybe you do not see that heaven is one place with a great many people in it, all praising the Lord God for HIS love for us. This is the truest reason for Thanksgiving, an effort for all to give HIM praise and thanksgiving for all HE does.
At Christmas, we stop and remember that Jesus Christ is God, that gave up HIS celestial existence in heaven to come here to earth and be born as a human being. Everyone likes to run around singing Christmas songs, yet how many of them are about Jesus Christ’s birth? The idea to use “Merry X-mas or Happy Holidays” is a strike against the Lord for obvious reasons. It is an attempt to denigrate the existence of the Lord God Almighty. That is rebellion against God, it is blasphemy in the use of HIS precious and Almighty Name. That is SIN.
This is a time to clearly understand that Jesus Christ came to redeem and reclaim us. He was born to die. I know many people who have told me the same about their grandfathers or whomever, dying in battles around the world. I am a combat soldier of the past and I know for a fact that NO ONE enters a battle with the idea of dying. Soldiers enter into battle, hoping and praying they don’t die, they want to live to see another Christmas with their loved ones. I have been in that situation and I know this to be a fact.
We need to understand something here. And I will lay this out with Scripture as well. Jesus Christ is God. That being the case, God chose to become a human being for the sole purpose of redeeming you and me from OUR sin—with His blood that HE shed on that Roman Cross at Calvary. God chose this for HIMSELF, it was HIS sacrifice for you and me, because HE is a just and righteous God who will NOT allow Sin in HIS presence in heaven.
If HE had not come, we (as in all of us) would NEVER see heaven and that would then be against the very reason HE created you and me in the first place. Here are the Scripture that bear these statements out:
John 14:8-9: “Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?”
Hebrews 9:26: “For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.”
Proverbs 6:16: “These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him.”
Titus 2:13-14: “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”
Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
We see the Scriptures above that prove how God feels about your sin and mine, and what we must do to be saved from an eternal life of destruction. Here is a passage of Scripture that I love to read and know in my heart, because it represents everything about Jesus Christ, who IS GOD:
John 3:16-21: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.”
As you see we are never without sin but the great news is that we have a way out, so to speak. Coming to Jesus Christ, because He sacrificed HIS life on that Cross at Calvary, is the only way to the Father. Our sin must be covered by the blood of Jesus Christ. There is NO other way around it—that is the reason for the birth of Jesus Christ, the reason He was to die for you and for me.
In my heart, there is no reason to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ if we are NOT willing to know and accept the death of Jesus Christ on the Cross. You cannot have one without realizing the necessity for the other, and you can change them up any way you want and it still comes out the same. Without sin being covered by the blood of Jesus Christ, there will be NO forgiveness of sin and your eternal destination will end up being the lake of fire
Maybe now, you can realize that the indifference in “Merry X-mas or Happy Holidays” is squarely a blasphemy to the Lord God Almighty, which is sin and that needs the blood of Jesus Christ. Removing the word “Christ” from any of this, is to remove Jesus Christ from your life and that means eternal death. If there is one passage of Scripture to show this, in my mind and heart it would be;
Luke 12:29-31: “And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.”
As we venture into Thanksgiving, let us all be truly thankful to the Lord God for all HE has blessed us with and be content with what we have. As Christmas comes near, we need to know the entire reason for HIS birth, that it is a celebration of HIS birth before HIS chosen death on the Cross of Calvary for you and me. Celebrate these special holidays with a true heart of thankfulness and gratitude for HIS unending love for us.