Should Christ be put into Christmas?
Question:
It just doesn't seem right that we shouldn't bring Christ into everything. I thought that's what we were supposed to do. Wouldn't it be alright to sing carols about Christ because they are just songs about his birth, even though some of them might have Christmas in them?
This is really difficult for me because at my church we do singing Christmas carols with Jesus in them (but aren't we supposed to sing praises to God?) and we do the nativity scene and stuff like that. At my house, we are all Christians and we put up angels and stars on the trees and the nativity scene and try to bring Christ into everything and stuff like that (we always have). Same with most of the rest of my family, friends, cousins, etc. I have just been around that stuff all the time, and I don't really want to tell them that we should not be doing that, but I do if it is wrong because then wouldn't we be all sinning? We also bring Christ into Easter and St. Patrick's Day and holidays like that! This is super difficult for me!
Answer:
Right and wrong aren't measured by the level of difficulty. I know far too many people who excuse themselves because it seems too difficult for them to avoid sin.
Worship of God is defined by God and not man. It is God who is being worshiped and it is God who decides how He wants to be worshiped.
Jesus talked about people thinking they were pleasing to him by doing things their own way. They credited Christ, but Jesus wasn't happy with them. "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'" (Matthew 7:21-23). Therefore, just because Jesus is brought into something, it doesn't make it right. You cannot claim permission ("in his name") for something he has not given permission. Anything we do must first have his permission. "And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him" (Colossians 3:17).
Think of it this way, if something becomes right simply because a man claims to dedicate it to Jesus or that man is using Jesus' authority (without Jesus' permission), then we would have chaos. Anything would be "right." As a matter of fact, that is what has happened in the religious world. People do as they please and then claim after the fact that God would approve of it if He thought of it first. "For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ" (Galatians 1:10).
The command regarding what we sing in worshiping God is "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord" (Colossians 3:16). We sing songs about Christ's birth at times. They fall into the category of hymns or spiritual songs. We just don't restrict those songs to the end of the year because God didn't say when Jesus was born. The few hints we have would put his birth in the warmer seasons. But the songs we choose to sing are examined for accuracy. We don't sing "on this Christmas day" because God did not assign a day to celebrate Christ's birthday. We don't sing about the little drummer boy. That is a man-made fable. We don't sing about three wise men visiting him at his birth because the Bible doesn't say how many wise men there were and they didn't get to Bethlehem until a year or more after he was born. To sing songs that are not accurate would no longer be singing spiritual songs.
The truth is that Easter started in the second century, Christmas didn't begin until the fourth century, and St. Patrick's Day didn't start until the 17th century. All came after the New Testament was completed and none were requested by God. St. Patrick's Day is about a bishop in Ireland who lived in the fifth century.
