Tis The Season
By: Matt King
Tags: Bible, Bible Study, Devotional, Student Ministry

You know every year Christmas rolls around and we begin decorating and listening to Christmas music, maybe watch a Hallmark movie (or ten…no I’m not speaking about myself…), and just get in the Christmas spirit!

*Newsflash real quick, if you’re the type of person who starts Christmas music before Thanksgiving…Jesus saves, that’s all I’m going to say on that subject!*

It’s a time where hopefully joy fills us and begins to impact so much of our lives because naturally, Christmas is a celebration! (For some, it may not be, we don’t always have a choice regarding the things that happen in life, and if that’s you, I hope that this Christmas can be a new chapter of finding a little more joy for your life as you look to the birth of Jesus.) However, I truly believe that Christmas is now a holiday that brings joy, but it also bring a tremendous amount of stress and anxiety and it’s stealing the joy that we do get, or at least lessening it dramatically.

Listen to these stats, they’re crazy…

Americans in 2019 spent about $1 TRILLION on Christmas gifts. That’s trillion…1,000,000,000,000…12 zeroes…

The average household will spend $942 in gifts for the family

The average household will spend about $1500 during Christmas for food, gifts, decorations, etc.

The average American spends 15 hours shopping for Christmas gifts, or 900 minutes

The average American spends 15 hours at Christmas parties each year

22% of Americans will go into debt so that they can pay for Christmas

Then throw in the people who spend weeks of time putting up all of the decorations and inflatables and the amount of time spent on Christmas is insane.

Throw all of that together and you can begin to see why Christmas may just be a more stressful holiday than it is a joyful one. And what’s even more worrying is that Christians are just as much a part of this as non-Christians are, when we are supposed to be the ones that focus on Christmas for the “right reason”.

So this year, I’m hoping that we can begin to make a change. I’m not going to advocate for no shopping, or gifts, or decorating, because I love all of those things, they’re a lot of fun to do and I love giving gifts to people. What I will advocate for goes back to what we talked about yesterday with the Messiah being the Prince of Peace and what that name contains.

So there’s this guy named J. Alec Motyer and he’s a really smart guy, a lot smarter than I am, and he did a pretty awesome work on the book of Isaiah. When it comes to this specific name, he highlights that fact that Prince of Peace carries the weight of “peace is well-being (Gen. 29:6) and freedom from anxiety (1 Sam. 1:17). In relationships, it is goodwill and harmony (Ex. 4:18)…” I love what he says here, it’s loaded with good truth!

Well-being is the concept of being comfortable, healthy, and happy, which can’t be had when anxiety going crazy. Anxiety is incredibly uncomfortable, it wreaks havoc on your health, and it definitely does not make you happy! Peace doesn’t just bring well-being, it also destroys the very thing that will destroy your well-being! That’s what Jesus came to earth to bring and what his kingdom will bring when he one day returns to take us with him back to Heaven. That’s good news!

Additionally, peace brings goodwill and harmony to relationships (don’t think just dating here). Christmas is a time for family to gather and celebrate together, but there is a lot in this world that can destroy harmony. It could anything from death, abuse, hurt, abandonment, you name it. And with all of those comes a heavy dose of maybe what we’ll call “bad-will”, the opposite of goodwill. Peace flips everything on its head. Jesus flips everything on its head when he comes to earth because his peace can take that which is damaged and restore it to what is good. It may not be whole again, but it is good and there is harmony to be found in the midst of it.

The problem with the way that America does Christmas is that we intentionally allow anxiety in, harmony is hard to come by because of all the personalities involved, and goodwill might be hard to find when you don’t get what you hoped/asked for. Americans and Christians included are so consumer driven that while we say, “Jesus is the reason for the season,” we are also saying, “Jesus isn’t the focus of this season, all of my plans and people and gifts and Christmas dinner and the decorations and pleasing the in-laws and on and on are the focus of the season.” (I got a little anxiety just writing that sentence!)

Hear me now, ALL OF THOSE THINGS ARE NOT BAD THINGS! We just give them way too much power in our lives and we forget that Jesus intended for the remembrance of his birth to be something that brings peace and joy. I recently was reading a book where the author mentioned that his kids when they were young got so much anxiety from opening all of their gifts on Christmas morning because they didn’t know which gift to play with and couldn’t decide what they enjoyed the most and saw all of the other gifts and it just created little terror monsters out of his kids. So, to fix the issue, the said they were going to do 5 kids for each child and open one gift a day until they open their last gift on Christmas morning. They also focused on making each gift much more intentional as they began to see what each of their kids was into. The result was joy in each day getting to open a gift and interact with that gift for a whole day, only to open another on the next day. As they did this, it was far easier to keep the focus on Jesus because they purposefully slowed down the Christmas season for their family instead of making it one massive production on one day.

You might be saying, “Im just a kid or I don’t have a family of my own,” and that’s ok! The reality is that you can still slow down Christmas for you as well. Maybe you suggest a slow down idea to your family and try something new. Maybe you help cook dinner or maybe you cook it yourself for you parents so they don’t have to. Maybe you try to make each gift this year super intentional, not just one that looks cool and they would probably enjoy it. Get creative and let the joy of being generous drive you, just as Jesus came to earth to give himself for us.

If Jesus is the Prince of Peace, and he is, that we have to let him be that for us during this Christmas season. As we remember Jesus, we have to remember that this whole gift giving and dinners and decorating was just man-made traditions that are a lot of fun, but can distract us from what’s important if we aren’t careful. This season should be one of rest and relaxation with family and friends, where the past is forgiven and harmony is sought after, where anxiety is a distant thought, and people feel the joy of love and affection from Jesus.

So I leave you with this, let peace surround you during this Christmas season, focus on Jesus and his joy will find its way into your heart.

Merry Christmas, I’m signing off for a few days to rest myself, but I’ll see you next week!

Passage to read: Luke 2

Prayer to pray: Jesus, thank you for this Christmas season, but even more importantly, thank you for coming to earth to live just as I do. Thank you for giving up Heaven to come to earth to die for my sins. Thank you Jesus for conquering death and rising again so that we can live in peace with a God who is alive and with us! Help me this time to seek peace, harmony, and goodwill towards those around me and may you bless them as well. I love you Jesus and am grateful for all that you have given me. In your name I pray, amen.