You are here
The Real Meaning of Christmas
By Jay Haug
Special to Virtueonline
www.virtueonline.org
December 20, 2010
Is it too picky to suggest that President Obama has both truncated and distorted the meaning of Christmas as articulated at the National Christmas Tree lighting?
I don't think so. If I am correct, our president stands in a big crowd of Americans who will sing carols, give gifts, go to church and write checks to charity, yet miss what is the essential core of Christmas. It was certainly entirely appropriate for him to mention the history of the ceremony and to thank our men and women in uniform who are away from home operating in difficult conditions.
However, then Mr. Obama says, " It's a story that's dear to Michelle and me as Christians, but it's a message that's universal: A child was born far from home to spread a simple message of love and redemption to every human being around the world....It's a message that says no matter who we are or where we are from, no matter the pain we endure or the wrongs we face, we are called to love one another as brothers and as sisters." I don't object to these sentiments. They are admirable. But they are not the heart of the Christmas message.
Years ago, a Boston television station ran an editorial that stated the message of Christmas was "peace on earth among men of good will."
I replied that though this translation of the angelic message in Luke 2 is possible, context demands it be translated "peace on earth goodwill toward men" or "peace on earth among men on whom His favor rests."
To their credit, I responded to them and they corrected their mistake. But why is this distinction important?
Very simply, Jesus Christ was born into a world unable to generate good will.
It was a world, according to John 1, that was filled with "darkness", that " did not recognize him" and "received him not." Christmas is primarily not about human effort, charity, "loving one another as brothers and sisters," or any other human deed or thought.
In fact, we live in a world where too often "the pain we endure and the wrongs we face" often leave us completely unable to love one another, powerless in the face of the demand to be different. What is the evidence?
Today's media headlines. Yes, that one, this one and the other one. They all tell the same story. In so very many ways, the dark, divided, rejecting world that Christ entered still threatens to win out. "The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it." John 1:5.
Part of the Christmas message is universal because it can reach all people.
Yet we cannot get to the universal by passing over the particular, the "scandal of particularity" that God chose His son Jesus to redeem the world.
The facts and historicity of Christmas are absolutely unique and they stand against any attempt by humankind to save itself by good and charitable deeds. It is only by visiting angels that Scrooge is transformed, not by reading self-improvement books on "loving mankind."
Christ was born into a world unable to love, to redeem that world on a painful cross.
This is the radically graceful and unique work of Christ. It is more than a "story" and a "message."
It is and was the singular work of God toward hopeless and powerless man desperately in need of redemption.
To trust in Christ and no other is our only hope of radical transformation, both in this life and the next.
For all of us, may we look a little more deeply and "come and see this great thing that has come to pass."
In forsaking the shortcuts to platitudes, we will find the true and saving message of Christmas.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2010/12/obama-national-christmas-tree-lighting.html
---Jay Haug is a member of Redeemer Anglican Church in Jacksonville, Florida. You may e-mail him at cjcwguy@gmail.com
