Stephen Bleile

The Penultimate Christmas Eve Post…

Yes, it is the day before the day before Christmas.  I spent the day trying to convert me Mudder-in-laws tractor from a front end loader to a snow blower.  Six manuals and as many hours later I succeeded with the accompanying sense of fulfillment that can only be experienced by someone who can truly say “Vini Vidi Vici.”

Somewhere in the distance carols blare from Daffle’s (That’s my Fawder-in-law) computer speakers.

I have a love hate relationship with carols.  Every now and then they succeed in raising my spirit.  Other times they make me think of nothing more than the buying extravaganza that I am conditioned to believe I MUST be a part of.  (Did you know that last year some $26B (that’s $26,000,000,000) worth of gift cards were exchanged?) Sometimes I sing soulful versions of I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas.  It’s funny, actually, as I’d be every bit as pleased with a brown Christmas. Keep in mind dead grass needn’t  be removed from the driveway with a tractor that requires a face lift from front end loader to snow blower.

Daffle just told Tash the true origin of Christmas trees.  Turns out it’s a phallic symbol associated with Saturnalia – an ancient Roman festival.  As the story goes Pope Pius III couldn’t stamp out the festival so he decided it would be a good idea to sort of mash Christmas into it.  It’s a sort of high-level case of,  “If you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em.” Well sort of.  We’ve been carrying on with the tradition ever since.  Oh well, the tree Tash is working on is quite nice anyways.

Yup, like it or not folks, there are very few people, who know about these things, -if any- who think Jesus was born on or near December 25th.  Some say that Jesus was actually born about 2 B.C in the spring time.  (This would, of course, mean that Jesus was born “Before Christ;” which has more than a few theological implications we shan’t discuss here.  The numbers work well with Him being born year zero, so let’s just role with it.)

Actually, the whole idea of celebrating Jesus’ birth doesn’t come up very often in the Bible.  The three wise guys, some shepherds and likely the little tike’s parents are portrayed as rejoicing, but most other folks didn’t seem to make much of a fuss. Well, there was a major exception.  One of the big wheels of the day ordered all the males under 2 killed to try to eliminate baby Jesus.  I suppose that should be omen enough to anyone that the poor kid was not going to have an average life.

More often than not the Bible DOES talk about celebrating his death. No kidding.

I suppose to be super accurate you would have to say the Bible talks about celebrating His resurrection.  The point is you can’t be resurrected unless you die and thus His death gets celebrated a lot. It’s sort of a two-for-one deal and you can’t have one without the other.

Why celebrate the death and resurrection?  Well, it’s a bit like when your Uncle Marty fought cancer and won.  Or the way you broke your arm last ski season, but you’re ready to tackle the slopes again.   When people overcome adversity we celebrate.  Considering death normally wins you’d have to say His victory was an upset of titanic proportions.  (Even more staggering than the Giants defeating the “un-defeatable” Patriots to win the Super Bowl.)

The other reason it’s worth celebrating is that the Bible seems to imply (READ: state directly) that we can live with the same overcoming power in our lives.  I don’t think that means we’ll never die, but it does mean we can be raised from the dead.  I suppose this means we can walk free of depression, discouragement, despair, loneliness, and when it’s all over we can be raised to life (presumably) in heaven.

If you want to read the Christmas story as told in the Bible you can go here:  http://read.ly/Luke1.27.NIV

For the death and resurrection this is your spot:  http://read.ly/Luke22.1.MSG

Merry Christmas, and don’t let this get you down.  It’s good to celebrate Jesus.

sb

PS.  Some say candy canes are actually “J’s” for Jesus.  This article says it’s bunk, but I’m sure, by now, we have to know that you can’t believe everything we read on the internet.