Should a Christian celebrate Christmas?
John Beardsley, a Christian with a web site (a rarity, I know, says the Christian with a web site), asks the rhetorical question, “Should a Christian Celebrate Christmas?”
At the link, he gives an extensive “no” to his own question. The article is good, in that it provides answers to the “where did we get this from?” questions about Christmas traditions, decorations, and even the holiday itself.
That being said, I’m not on board with his conclusion…to abstain from the festivities. I’m more on board with the receive, reject, redeem taxonomy articulated by Mark Driscoll.
Many of the people who ask the topic question do so a lot, under a larger formulaic question of Should a Christian X Y? In this question, X is a verb, and Y is a direct object of the verb. Other variations of this question in history have included:
Should a Christian…
- celebrateEaster?
- celebrate Halloween?
- celebrate Passover?
- celebrate birthdays?
- read Harry Potter?
- read the Twilight books?
- read The Shack?
- read the NIV version of the Bible?
- vote for Democrats?
- vote for Adam Lambert?
- support the right of women to vote?
- support the right of African Americans to vote?
- own slaves?
- practice yoga?
- practice birth control?
- get a tattoo?
- sue other people?
- eat meat?
- eat junk food?
- go to church?
- play Dungeons and Dragons?
- play sports on Sunday?
- watch American Idol?
- watch The Sopranos?
- watch The Passion of the Christ?
- and so on…
So here’s where the 3R question opens to the bigger issue. Each Christian is responsible for deciding on each issue where to receive, where to redeem, and where to reject. This is the essence of liberty. It is the freedom to explore, to strive to follow the Spirit’s guidance, and to live in grace and mercy.
If you are a Christian, you are free to discover what’s right. You don’t need me to tell you what to do. In posts to follow, I’ll be sharing what we have discovered, not to tell you what you should do, but just to maybe provoke thought in you and help you decide for yourself what to do. In some of these things, we’ve changed:
- from “reject” to “redeem”
- from “receive” to “redeem”
- from “receive” to “reject”
I’ve been wrong about some things, and right about others. I reserve the right to change my mind in the future if at any point I realize that I’m wrong about things I currently think I have right. And you have every right to think I’m wrong about what I have right, right about what I have wrong, and wrong and right about what I have wrong, and right, respectively.
The point is, if you are a Christian, you are free. Living in freedom means you are free to pursue your responsibility to think for yourself, free to obey God’s Holy Spirit as you perceive him leading, and free to change when you discern change is needed.
