Christmas: It Brings Out the Best and the Worst In People!

Christmas: It Brings Out the Best and the Worst In People   Kelly Durant 12-22-13

Luke 2:10 And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.12 And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,14 Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

2. It seems many of our parents were romantic people in February! Last month in November we had over a dozen Birthdays of our members! Birthdays are fun and everyone gets to eat and party just because you were born, nice right? But how would it be if everyone celebrated your Birthday and no one invited you?  Imagine all your friends and relatives all eating and having a good time but you were not on their list of invited ones?! How would you feel? Also think of the anger if you were the one paying for the extravagant party at someone’s place and then everyone ignored you! This is what happens to Jesus Christ every year on Christmas, too few worship Him on Christmas celebrating it as His birthday!

  God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit become very active every year in the Christmas season! People, I observe, become more extreme and go through a lot of emotions and consequently do more good or more bad at this time of year. With some people there is increased happiness, love, and sharing, but yet with others, there is an abundance of anger, destruction, jealousy, and greed. The very first Christmas started out with extreme feelings and this pattern continues on this way ever since.

3. In these verses of the Bible in Luke 2 of the story of Jesus, we see that everything began with many wonderful sentiments for the good news! There was good news from the angel communicating to the Virgin Mary before Jesus birth that her son would be the Savior of the world.  And then later when Jesus was born the angels proclaimed good feelings to the common people, people like you and me, the shepherds, that Jesus’ life brings glory to God and peace to all men for perpetual generations!

  Just imagine what joy, what love, what thankfulness, and praise these receptive humble people felt! If you are God’s child you will feel it too! Consider Joseph & Mary and the shepherds; we can try to envision the bone shaking emotions they felt that night when the sky lit up with the brightness of the Glory of God through the angels! There was great fear but it soon became great joy and peace! God sent down pure love, pure happiness, pure good intentions. How wonderfully emotionally moving Jesus birth was!

4. All things changed forever with the birth Jesus! Before that moment in time no one on earth knew how much God was a God of love! Since the beginning within all cultures, due to man’s sin and separation from God, God was considered to be some angry distant “great one”. He was cruel and demanded great sacrifices from his subjects, even human sacrifices, and severe punishments ensued for minor infractions. No one in Israel, or in the world, ever expected God, and his angels, to be ones who would come in peace and love to save the souls of mortals like you and I to live in a heavenly kingdom for all eternity! This is what it all means!

    Christmas implicates a new light of revelation and a new way of life! Jesus after growing up communicated God’s precepts of love to live by, to love God and your neighbor. He demonstrated His love for each of us in His power of healing, and miracles. Without Jesus being the love offering of God we would be stuck in the old Jewish system (or some Satanic one) of trying to appease the wrath of God for our sins with animal sacrifices and burdensome traditions like some continue on with today. Or we’d continue to suffer under horrible misconceived rituals as was started in Egypt, and spread to Africa, Latin America, and all over the world!

    Every person on earth with all their emotions should cry out with their voices in thanks to God like never before for what Christmas implies! Christmas with Jesus birth brings salvation and renovation of the soul, liberation from oppressors, and a better and different way of life that produces love, joy, peace, and purpose.

5. It is sad but true but there are people who hate Christmas and hate seeing others happy! If you don’t know about this, search the web and you’ll be shocked at the very vocal Christ haters! Since Christmas makes children and adults happy, there are demons out there that detest it! There are many horrible, bitter, and willfully spiritually blind rebellious ignorant people out there who hate Christians and Christmas, Jesus, God, love and everything good! This is because they love their own selves only, their god is their pride, evil ways, and sins, and they want to be worshipped as god. These mockers at any cost they try to eliminate the good in others by persecution, hate, cruel words, and mockery. After all, Jesus is competition taking the focus away from them!

   Recall how King Herod was jealous and hated the fact that other kings and people arrived to worship Jesus. Matt 2:16 Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying, 18 In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.

  The murderous King Herod spirit continues on today in people who resist Jesus. These people ignorantly or wilfully try to make Christmas into a frivolous fantasy, or a greedy materialistic gifting event, which distracts from the purpose of the event which is the worshipping of Jesus in admiration and thankfulness for His coming! Another sad reality is some Christians even ruin Christmas! The holier-than-thou people, thinking they are more doctrinally correct (but are often quite unloving), criticize everyone’s enjoyment of Christmas because Christmas to them is an evil pagan worship. Here is how I see it, all things are what you make them to be, either used for good, or used for bad! True Christians celebrate the fact that Jesus was born and no evil from 2,000 year old customs ways in their minds!

    Many corrupted souls derive pleasure in ruining the happiness and fellowship of others! Often you are forced to share meals with bad family members that destroy your Christmas spirit of love, happiness, and unity.  This year maybe you should try something different and spend your Christmas with real worshippers of Jesus and forget the rest! God divides between sheep and goats, between the good people who are like Mary & Joseph and the humble shepherds, and the bad people who are like King Herods: So we too as individuals must use discretion & discernment.

6. This year I suggest you talk non-stop about Jesus to your greedy materialistic insincere friends or relatives. If after celebrating 10 or more Christmas’s with you and they are still mockers of your faith in Jesus and critical of your church, and mad that you give them only a simple gift, then give them the reward of some time alone to learn to appreciate you, Jesus, and their blessings! I Cor 10: 20 But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. 21 Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils.

   At Christmas time when people’s senses are getting awakened with pleasant pine smells, when eyes are stimulated with colorful decorations, when sweet foods fill the air it is unfair and unjust that an embittered, ugly, rude, critical, mocking jealous person be in your midst sharing with you who has nothing good to say about Jesus and about your service to God in your Salvation Army church or where ever you attend! Remind ugly self-centered materialistic influenced-by-the-world trouble makers of Jesus’ love and warnings! Here is one, Jesus says, “Don’t give your pearls to swine who later want to trample you!”

 7. It is sad but true but unless these Jesus and Christmas haters repent and accept God’s gift to the world of love, and obey Jesus’ message, unless they consciously transform into the total opposite of who they are now, then their soul will become forever frozen in a burning fire of guilt and shame forever, condemned to an eternal prison now and after death because they, by their own choice, insisted on remaining infected by their own poisonous pride, rejecting the healer who went to  the cross, the Savior, the gift of Christmas, baby Jesus!

  Because of Jesus the life of the billions of people who were, and are (and will be) Christians is so much better than the billions of others who live without Him under horrible oppressive, unjust, depressing regimes and sterile religions that kill their own people by the millions! Life with Jesus today is so much simpler, so much more blessed with the Holy Spirit’s joy, and life is so much more full of happiness, worship, and joy because of Jesus coming on that beautiful first Christmas Day! It is great to celebrate no matter if it was 12-25 or 3-25! And Jesus promised to return to give us a place in heaven, so how wonderful is that!

  If you have never fully accepted Jesus, if you felt uncomfortable that maybe you are one of the ones who has been bitter and resistant to God for all these years, then today is your chance to change! Accept Jesus now and repeat this prayer with us…Dear Jesus, thank you for coming to earth to show us God’s pure love. I ask you to forgive my sins and I repent from the bad things I do. I accepted you, Jesus, as the Son of God into my heart. Thank you for giving your life as a sacrifice on the cross for me so I could attain the gift of eternal life. Give me your Holy Spirit to guide me to obey every word you taught. It is in your name, Jesus, I pray, amen!