Christmas 2012

12/22/2012

It has been a very long and eventful couple of weeks.

To start with, in a weird deja vu development, Grandma Lila again has a fractured hip. Last year at this time we were just bringing her home from assisted living to deal with recovery from another fracture to a different part of the same exact joint. That was a very rough couple of weeks for a variety of reasons and the actual physical caring for Grandma is much easier this time around. For one thing, it appears the pain medicine she already takes for her neuropathy is covering whatever pain there might be from the fracture - one of our hardest tasks has actually been convincing her that she can't stand or walk on the leg because to her mind, it's fine.

The very sobering part of this news, however, is that Grandma apparently fractured her hip by doing...nothing at all that should've broken anything. Apparently the bone around the old spacer in her right hip is growing so fragile that it broke just from the strain of walking on it. This could very well mean that Grandma will no longer be walking any distance at all, walker or no walker. We knew when we brought Grandma home that this was an almost inevitable development, but it's a little shocking to have it happen so soon. We are still hopeful that this isn't the case, of course, but it's hard not to draw that conclusion given the circumstances surrounding this latest fracture. We have an appointment with the orthopedic doctor who gave us such good advice last year and we'll know more after that. In the meantime, we're being well-prepared for our imminently arriving newborn by getting up several times a night for a half-hour to help Grandma to the bathroom and back. I told Ben last night that I'm very hopeful the bell Grandma rings to tell us she needs help will wake the baby up too so we can get them on the same schedule - otherwise we are going to be even more sleep-deprived than the average new parent!

I'm also down to five weeks left before the estimated due date and the midwife tells us that the baby is already engaged and it's her opinion he/she "is either going to come early or you're going to need a bigger body" as the baby is pretty well taking up all available room. I'm beginning to be pretty uncomfortable most of the time and am starting to look forward to having the baby outside rather than inside, lack of sleep or no. I'm disgusted to note I didn't inherit my mom's genes as much as I'd hoped and my feet and ankles are definitely swelling if I spend longer than a half-hour standing on them.

All of that being a prelude to what I feel is a very important and difficult-to-phrase blog post.

Last year, with all the hustle and bustle of our wedding closely followed by moving Grandma, it somehow was not apparent that Ben and I had decided to not celebrate Christmas in the traditional sense. This year things have been much more settled (fracture notwithstanding) and it came to Mom Turner's attention we were not decorating for Christmas. When she began asking why and discovered we were actually avoiding Christmas, it caused a lot of hurt feelings (including from Grandma Lila, who gave me a pretty sharp scolding about it the other day). Because it was hard on Mom, she began discussing the situation with others close and the result is a lot of people don't quite know how to approach Christmas with us this year. A dear neighbor brought us the beautiful wreath she'd purchased as a Christmas gift for us and asked humbly if we would be offended by it, for instance, and another close relative was very concerned about bothering us by sending us a Christmas card.

We are very touched by and appreciative of the concern, but we're a little distressed that we've caused so much upset, so here is our best explanation of what we think of Christmas and how we're approaching it for the time being.

We've been spending a lot of time considering what it means to have good things get mixed with bad and what that ultimately does to the good thing. In the case of Christmas, Christians a long time ago essentially took a very pagan holiday and rather than cancelling it altogether, decided to attempt redeeming it by turning the focus from having a big wild party to celebrating the birth of Jesus our Savior.

Good thing: celebrating Jesus' birth instead of having wild drunken revelries in honor of Saturn.

Bad thing: bringing methods of worshiping other gods into the worship of the One True God.

Now, as Grandma Lila has repeatedly pointed out to us, "we don't worship those things!" She's correct. We no longer bring pine trees in from the woods as symbols of fertility and put sacrifices under them to the wood-gods. We just don't. A Christmas tree in today's family living room is not being worshiped as a god.

The problem is, the whole reason for bringing it in comes from the worship of a pagan god.

One of the biggest questions Ben and I have asked ourselves when it comes to deciding how our family is going to work is pretty simple: "Do we know if this makes God happy or not?"

Sometimes we have to guess based on things God has said and done even if he never specifically addressed the situation we're looking at (homeschooling is an example of this). Other times, God is pretty clear about what he thinks (as in the case of the Sabbath). When it comes to Christmas, the thing God said that sticks in our mind is pretty straightforward: he said to his special people, "Don't you worship me in the same way the heathens worship their gods - that's completely disgusting to me!"

Actual verses:

Deuteronomy 12:29-31 (ESV)

29“When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations whom you go in to dispossess, and you dispossess them and dwell in their land,30take care that you be not ensnared to follow them, after they have been destroyed before you, and that you do not inquire about their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods?—that I also may do the same.’ 31You shall not worship the LORD your God in that way, for every abominable thing that the LORD hates they have done for their gods, for they even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods. [emphasis mine]

There are more and harsher verses, but this all by itself is pretty strong evidence of what God thinks: don't add the worship of a not-god to the worship of the real God. And bringing in a Christmas tree as part of the celebration or worship of God - commemorating his Son's birth - sounds like something God would not be too thrilled about. So after considering this, our conscience begins deeply troubling us when we look at combining the pagan traditions with the celebration of Jesus' birth. Which we came to find out didn't even occur in December, let alone on the 25th, so in a weird sort of way it would almost be easier for us to consider Christmas if Jesus were left out of it altogether since he doesn't seem to belong there in the first place. This, however, is a whole sticky matter in and of itself. There are many, many opinions on this subject and all sides get pretty touchy.

Now, the tricky thing about Christmas is that there are two parts to it. There is the religious/philosophical aspect (which is the basis for why we're not decorating); and there is the simple family get-together aspect. The time we spend with our family is very precious to us and we believe it is precious to God as well. The Christmas cards that come in the mail with letters and photos of our friends and family are special and we look forward to them. It is true, as one friend we know puts it, that if we really love our family we should show it other times than just at Christmas; but it's also true that it's very hurtful to our family to absent ourselves at a time they are used to the family being together.

We also have Grandma Lila living with us in our home and she is both very offended and hurt by the suggestion we are not doing Christmas. She has absolutely made it clear that we can do whatever weird thing we're doing but she is NOT going to give up her Christmas tree or the other elements of the Christmas celebration that we were troubled about. Because she is our grandmother and is our authority, it isn't our place to determine this for her and we have done our best to honor her wishes in this respect, including putting her small tree up in her room and putting her Christmas CDs on while she's sitting in the living room and other such things.

The truth is, we don't think anyone celebrating Christmas is evil for doing so, just as we don't believe those who do not rest on the Sabbath are evil. The only reason doing or not doing those things means anything at all has to do with how we want to relate to God. A person has to be convicted of what God wants them to do or they will be acting out of empty tradition, from a sense of obligation to rules rather than out of a love for God. Doing anything without a conviction of the truth can be much more harmful than not.

We believe that there are things we can do to please or displease God and we are doing our best to understand those things for ourselves and for our children out of gratefulness for the life God has given us and the chance we have to be in the relationship with him that kids have with their daddy. Most of us actually will take some pretty extraordinary steps to get a pleased smile of approval and the comfort of knowing our parents here on Earth are happy with us. We want to have that same closeness with the Father who made us, so if there is a suggestion that something makes him happy or sad we want to be alert for it just like we would be for our dads here on Earth. This is why it wasn't difficult for us to give up a Christmas tree once we reached the conclusion that it was something God didn't want us to do.

So to please the Father who made us, we are attempting to remove the mixed-in pagan elements from worship of him; and to please our parents on Earth, we want to be available to spend the special time with them and enjoy their company and take pleasure in being together. There will be many more Christmas days for Mom to take photos of the babies growing up and us standing around the table before dinner and all the small things families do when they have deliberately set aside the time to spend together. We are not going to be sitting around the whole day thinking about how bad it is we have to be there. We do not have to have a Christmas tree or have the kids sit on Santa's lap or have exactly the same beliefs and traditions to share that specific time. And we are not going to be offended by those we love who do.

Emily25069

12/23/2012 04:13:49 pm

Interesting thoughts. I can definitely agree heartily with you that it is important to have a conviction about it before you do something.

There is some evidence however, and pretty convincing evidence (to me anyways) that the actual date of Christmas versus the pagan festival was the other way around, and that Christians had long calculated the date of Jesus's birth at December 25th and it was the pagans who took the date. Here is a description of this view. I do hold to this particular view, though I am always certainly open to being wrong.

http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=16-10-012-v

It is true that the way they calculated Jesus's birth is a bit odd though, to be certain. But it was a longstanding tradition to calculate the day of a prophets death as the day of his birth as well.

I don't think that modern day Christmas Tree's have a thing to do with pagan worship at all. From what I understand, the western tradition of a Christmas tree came into play much much later and is sort of combined with another feast day from early new testament times that was kept on December 24th. They hung fruit and nuts and things on that tree. I wish I could remember the specifics, but my memory fails me. I do know that it had something to do with Adam and Eve and creation though. If it weren't 3 in the morning, I'd look that up. (oh my! It's 3 in the morning!! I'll have to make this short. I have been up with a sniffly Simon who just can't seem to fall asleep)

Anyhow, I have always seen Christmas as 2 different things as well. There is the hedonistic/commercialized/feasting/decorating/green and red and Deck the Halls holiday, which might have some pagan elements mixed in, and I would probably go ahead and throw Christmas tree as decoration into that category. I don't actually know any Christians who worship God with a Christmas tree or view their Christmas tree as a worship thing at all. It seems to be just a traditional decoration, no more pagan in my mind than wedding rings or Thursday.

And then there is Christ's Mass, which is entirely Christian and hasn't much to do with any of those other things listed above and has been kept by Christians for many many years as a part of their liturgical calender. Here, during liturgy we worship God with hymns, praises, spiritual songs, scripture readings, etc. And this is the kind of worship specifically prescribed in the bible, both in old testament times all the way up to the book of Revelation. While we are not told to keep the feast of Nativity specifically, neither are we forbade it, and it is all scripture. It comes out of Luke 2. It was probably a lot less "merry" in early church times, but it was a part of their liturgical year, followed by circumcision of Christ, baptism of Christ, etc.

Lauren

12/26/2012 05:21:04 am

Emily,

Interesting article - although I think we have a difference of opinion with the author. Even he is admitting in the body of the article that there is no evidence for Christians having agreed on Jesus' birth being on the 25th other than the tenuous evidence of Aurelian generally hating Christians and Christians themselves having difficulty figuring out when Jesus was born because they either couldn't or wouldn't work with Jewish calendar dates. The evidence given in this article is frankly a little flawed with how the Jewish calendar actually works even when it's critiquing early Gentile Christian understanding and I also think that the author nailed it when he said Christians came up with a pretty much random date for Jesus' birth because they didn't want to learn the Jewish calendar (Christian attempts to "not Judaize" have caused us an awful lot of trouble over the years, I think).

It's also very telling that there really is no record at all of Christmas being a Christian holiday until after Aurelian's declaration (Christmas doesn't appear to have been celebrated until about 300 years after Jesus). The article is also a little disingenuous when it says that there was no significance in the Roman festal calendar surrounding the Winter Solstice. That statement is questionable at best. There are many pagan traditions across many cultures that deal with the shortest day of the year and the anxiousness of wanting the winter season to be over with. Romans are no exception. The Saturnalia took place at this time of the year before there was a declaration of December 25th itself being a significant date and Aurelian simply appears to have solidified it, in my opinion. The same way Thanksgiving in America used to be announced every year but was then declared to be a specific day during the 1940s. (I think it was the forties...it was pretty recently, though)

Part of the early Christian confusion when calculating Jesus' birth actually came from a misunderstanding about the date of Zechariah's burning the incense before the Lord and hearing about the impending birth of his son John. It was assumed that Zechariah was burning incense on the Day of Atonement, when in fact the only priest who would go into the Holy of Holies on that day would've been the High Priest, not one of the other members of the priesthood chosen by lot as Zechariah was. That is a mistaken understanding of how the priesthood functioned.

The same goes for how Passover works. Christians saw the word "Sabbath" included in the texts and assumed the Sabbath being mentioned at the time of Jesus' death was the Seventh Day Sabbath when in fact Passover itself is a Sabbath that begins at sundown no matter what day of the week it falls on. This means that trying to narrow down a modern calendar date of Jesus' death by saying it had to occur on a Friday to fit the Sabbath narrative (so it could've only taken place on certain years which then gave a Roman or Greek calendar date) is also a flawed understanding of how God's Feasts actually worked and were celebrated at the time of Jesus.

Regarding the Christmas tree: there's a pretty established non-religious timeline for how that tradition got started and it really doesn't have it roots in Christianity. I've read so many articles on both sides of the question that I think I could go cross-eyed; but it really does seem like the earliest form of Christmas tree came from Egypt and was actually a palm tree (symbolized basically that the sun-god was recovering from his illness and the days were going to get longer); and the Romans took a variation for their own Saturnalia feast (they used the fir tree because it was an evergreen and for the same general principle); and then the Western Christians rebirthed the idea (which had some strong Druid implications) in the Christmas plays where it symbolized the tree with the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. The whole thing is one long complicated sticky mess, in my opinion. But ultimately, it has nothing to do with God or with Jesus' birth from what I can gather and it has much stronger ties to paganism.

Ultimately, though, our beliefs on Christmas are a little different than those associated with the Sabbath, for instance. It isn't so clear cut to understand what to do. Especially when it comes to our family. I also agree that the beautiful hymns and all the Scripture make this a time when people spend a lot more time than usual celebrating God and his works.

Still, that does not make Christmas Biblical. It makes it a tradition of man. And as such, we have a choice whether we should continue the tradition or if our consciences are directing us away from it. And we feel directed away from it...

Emily

12/31/2012 11:42:12 am

I understand why you don't keep Christmas. I feel that it is a freedom in Christ issue that might just be covered by that scripture talking about the christians who eat meat and those who don't.. and those who keep certain Sabbaths and those who don't. Both sets are doing it unto God. I can't remember the scripture. I know that Christmas is not mentioned in the bible, but I certainly know that when I sing O Holy Night, I am certainly doing it unto God and for the glory of God. And imagining Jesus.. God as a baby.. its just.. well. Wow.

But anyhoo.. to me, a Christmas tree is a pretty decoration that has caught on. For me, it really has nothing to do with anything religious. (YET. I am thinking about making Chrismons for next year) Guilt by association I am leary of, because all our days of the week are named after different pagan Gods, and yet it would be sort of impractical to not use those names. Obviously, a Christmas tree is a lot less important. It would be a lot more confusing to those around us if we starting saying "the first day.. the second day" etc. (but that is biblical). I remember watching a documentary about some christian african tribesman moving to the US and they were very confused about the custom of having a Christmas tree. They wondered what exactly a pine tree could have to do with their Saviors birth. I agree. Nothing really. It is a tradition of man. And its certainly not biblical. But I do think they are pretty, and also mostly inconsequential. And also its a fun family tradition to put one up every year. I would have to feel very strongly to not keep our family's tradition.

I do think its a little peculiar and perhaps confusing to half celebrate it with folks who know that you feel it is wrong. But I know you wonder about that too. I think that would be the harder issue.. deciding whether or not to keep it going for the other relatives. My friend Tammy decided that it would make people more uncomfortable for them to be there. Your family has decided that its better to be there when families want to be close. I am sure the decision is sort of hard either way because either way there are hurt feelings, and that is never fun.

Anyways, I applaud you for sticking to your convictions and for being so gracious to those of us who do not share that conviction. Sometimes people can be awfully mean when they have an uncommon conviction. Not so with you and your family. :)

Have a great New Year, and I am so thankful for your family.

:)

Victoria

12/26/2012 10:22:09 am

Lauren-

Just wanted to drop you a note of encouragement to you. You're often on my mind, and when I saw this post I wanted to let you know that I appreciate your "gentle boldness"- keep sharing the Truth!

We need to have you over again- hopefully after baby comes, because I can't wait to see that little one!! :)

Love and Blessings,
Victoria

12/26/2012 11:00:21 am

Victoria,

Thank you very much for the encouragement! I did think quite a bit about your family while writing this post, since Christmas was part of the conversation we had while visiting. It's also been kind of a sad thing over the past several weeks. Causing hurt to people we love is not pleasant at all.

We would very much enjoy visiting you again, especially after the baby comes. And hopefully in the not-too-distant future, our house is going to gain enough room to be able to invite company to visit us! That's actually one of the things I'm looking forward to the most when it comes to the addition.

I hope you're enjoying the beautiful snow!

Love,
Lauren

Comments are closed.

Christmas 2012

Author: Lauren

Comment

Archives

Categories