Day 14 of Having a "Mary" Christmas in a Martha World
Ephesians 5:1; Proverbs 3:9; Luke 21:1-4; Luke 6:38; Matthew 25:36
Decorating the Christmas Tree, decorating the house, going to see Santa, shopping for gifts, wrapping gifts, cutting down the Christmas tree; these all may be on the list of family traditions you have. When we think of the religious traditions we have in our own families, it is a much shorter list.
Our families and traditions are such an important thing. When you are just starting your family, like me, you want to mend your family traditions with your husband’s traditions and you also want to create new ones as a family. We also want to make sure that the real reason for the season is the focus of our traditions and Christmas season. This is so hard to do in today’s society because there is so much pressure to push out our religious aspects and make it all disappear.
It is so sad that our traditions have become so secular that we are missing what the true reason of Christmas is. The real reason for Christmas is to celebrate the Savior’s birth, to celebrate that he came to world so that we could have life and so that we can have salvation. Shouldn’t we be out truly celebrating that, and not just that a fat man slides down a chimney and gives our children gifts?
“Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children” (Ephesians 5:1)
In Ephesians we see that we should be looking at this like we do as children do. Bright eyed, with total and complete innocence. Think about when a kid goes to a birthday party. They are so excited for the child’s birthday, they are excited to play games, excited to bring a gifts, and excited for that gift to be opened. Just like those little children, we should be so excited for Jesus’ birth. We should be preparing for it each and every day. Advent calendars, meditations with the Popes, reading the Christmas story over again and seeing what we get out of it each time.
We need to make sure that we are preparing our hearts and homes, as said before, to let the Lord enter in. But, how are we preparing if all of our traditions aren’t even focused around the Lord. How can we celebrate His birthday if we aren’t even recognizing the real reason for the season.
“I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
Jesus calls us to feed those in need and give those in need food. What a better family tradition to have; to go and help those in need. To feed those that don’t have the ability to provide for themselves.
This Christmas, let us look for ways that we can change our secular traditions into something centered around the true reason for the season.
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