It really is the holiday season. The stores are decorated for Christmas. Remember when they used to wait until after Thanksgiving? I am already thinking about Christmas cards and gifts. It seems to me that we miss one of our great opportunities as Christians during the holiday season. You would think that beginning with Thanksgiving, folks would be thinking of spiritual things. After all, we give thanks to God and then we begin to focus on the birth of His son.
But it doesn’t seem to work that way. We have managed to have Thanksgiving without being thankful to GOD and the war to take Jesus out of Christmas is waging stronger than ever. You don’t even see the “Keep Christ in Christmas” signs any more. People seem to acknowledge the value of being thankful or of giving gifts. They just don’t want to talk about the Gift Giver. We seem to believe that we can separate Christian Values from Christ.
A recent letter to columnist Carolyn Hax of The Washington Post seemed straightforward enough. “I am a stay-at-home mother of four who has tried to raise my family under the same strong Christian values that I grew up with,” the woman writes. “Therefore I was shocked when my oldest daughter, ‘Emily,’ suddenly announced she had ‘given up believing in God’ and decided to ‘come out’ as an atheist.”
At one time or other we have all tried to convey Christian values to our children. We are upset because our nation is not longer a “Christian” nation. By that we mean that it no longer adheres to Christian values. But we miss the point. The value isn’t in Christian values… the value is in Christ. You can’t instill values in a child without giving that child Jesus. You can’t have Christian values in a country without Jesus.
We shouldn’t be surprised that this is a problem. We try to have church without Jesus. We try to have school without him. We have tried to take Him out of Christmas. All the time insisting that we still want His “values” we just don’t want Him. His values are politically correct. He isn’t.
Christian values are the problem. Hell will be filled with people who were avidly committed to Christian values. Christian values cannot save anyone and never will. The gospel of Jesus Christ is not a Christian value, and a comfortability with Christian values can blind sinners to their need for the gospel. It’s the old lie that, on our own, we can be “good” enough. Christian values are about being good. That never works. Righteousness comes only from being “in Christ.”
This season let’s try to share more than our values. Let’s make an effort to do more than make others feel “good” about themselves or about us. Maybe we should try making them feel bad about themselves. That’s closer to the truth. People don’t need to be told everything is great. They need the truth. Let’s tell it to them the let’s share Jesus. He’s the only answer and the only value.
Be blessed.
NIckLe
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