[Forever, Chris Brown]

Christmas.

Huh.

You know, I used to hate it.  During my legalist years(click on the link.  Press ctrl + f, type in the word ' undercurrent', press enter, and then read from the paragraph it takes you to through the end of the post- it's actually kind of short, so do it!) I realized how materialistic everyone else is and then I became angry with people for desecrating a holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, turning it into a greedy whorefest of selfishness and family drama.

For any who aren't so much into the Christian nomenclature, Christian legalism is what happens when a person begins to focus on following rules, ones which they think are Biblical though some aren't.  Drinking alcohol is an example- the Bible gives freedom to drink responsibly- not get drunk- according to one's conscience but some Christians decide that the Bible forbids drinking alcohol.... I have friends whose faith I respect that believe this.  That said, some Christians- me in college and a few years beyond, for sure- are just practicing denial of certain things, particularly anything that is abused by culture such as drinking, TV, "non-Christian" music (I'll save that rant for another day), sex, etc.  These are all things that, when enjoyed within Biblical guidelines, such as sex between a husband and wife or an amazing microbrew on tap at your favorite local pub while talking theology with friends, are incredible gift from God! I'm so, so, so grateful to go to a solid, Bible-based, Jesus-loving church that gets this!

Sadly, though, many Christians feel like they are earning the favor of God, somehow able to be worthy of Jesus' gift of dying on the cross for their sins, if they deny themselves.  What happens, and what definitely happened to me, is that you start to focus on the rules you create and follow, your daily checklist to access God through your own efforts at holiness, and then you get judgmental and instead of loving people and engaging in culture, because you want people to know the amazing God named Jesus who has completely changed your life, you criticize and compare and you always come out looking holy and they always look like utterly godless pagans.

The problem with this is that Jesus- the only perfect man, the only One who never disobeyed God the Father, not even in motive or thought- didn't go around comparing Himself to others so He could feel better about Himself.  He was God, and He was completely and utterly secure in who He was as defined by God.  Instead of calling the woman at the well a whore and telling her to clean up her pathetic life He was honest with her about her sin (verse 17), then He told her who He was (verse 26), and when she brought her friends to meet Him Jesus shared the truth of the God's Word with them and they came to believe in Him as savior.

There are dozens of stories of how Jesus ministered to people, but my point is that I don't need to be the critical "Christian" (I put it in quotes because being critical and harsh isn't really Christian at all) comparing myself to everyone else and getting to feel better about myself.  Listen- I'm not a relativist.  I'm not ashamed to admit that Jesus Christ is the only way to God, the only Truth, and the only real source of a meaningful Life.    But getting mad at people who don't know Jesus for acting like people who don't know Jesus, turning the celebration of His birth into something completely not about Him... well, what else should one expect?  It's like getting mad at an infant for acting like a baby- babies ARE babies!  Ergo, they conduct themselves as babies do.  People who don't have a relationship with Jesus, in turn, act like people without Jesus... to expect them to embrace Christmas as a celebration of Jesus' birth is as ludicrous as expecting a toddler to conduct himself with the poise and maturity of an adult.

So, this year, I am working on enjoying Christmas.  It is a great time to embrace family and to remind money-crunched and stressed out friends that they don't have to live that way, that the baby Jesus grew up into a perfect man, One who died on a cross so that life could be about more than how other people think of us.  That's pretty Good News, and I hope to keep my heart focused on Christ this year instead of being frustrated with culture.

I'm even embracing decorations... after Christmas :)  We don't have any, and I'm too thrifty to buy them now. But when everything is on super clearance after Christmas I am going to load up so that next year Jas and I can be Christmassed out all through December!  We can do that and still remember that our God, our Jesus, is a good God because we can enjoy beautiful decorations without forgetting that He's why we celebrate.

So there you go... not so much about food(e) but still pretty meaningful to me.

Hasta, kids.