Christmastime Homily

This time of year is when most people aim for cheer. Charities bring in donations and department stores cut their prices. For many the stress of the holidays can be a strain that is difficult to bear. The pressure to buy a gift that appeases the expectations of our loved ones has turned the season into a bizarre competition to express love with gifts.

Each year the same Xmas circus puts its tents up to convince people they can show their appreciation for others with materialism. The expectations get grander each year until the whole convention becomes a burden, rather than a means to show you care. This is the nature of the holiday beast, it seeks to feed and in time you find your bank account and energy devoured.

As Christians we have the only means to emerge out of this mountain of materialism. To press that holiday beast back into the oblivion it came from. Our answer is Christ, He is able to cut through the holly facades that have covered this holiday. Only Jesus our Lord is able to break through this cold commercialism that has turned a holiday that was once “delightful” into one that is dreadful.

During this season there are plenty of slogans like “Keep Christ in Christmas,” and “Jesus is the Reason For The Season.” These mantras are helpful, but they tend to be lip service as the holiday beast wraps its candy cane coils around consumers. It is time we took the reindeer by the horns and slow this sleigh of selling. We need to take a lesson from Christ Himself, who did not get entangled by the world’s pace and whims. He did the Will of His Father, and did not become enslaved to expectations of people, “Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.” (John 6:15).

There is a way to enjoy the holidays and to slow this sled of stress down. If we but take the reins and hand them to our God and Friend Jesus, and go at our own pace, not being bullied by the holiday beast into guilt gift buying, then perhaps this most ‘wonderful time of year’ can be so again. It is time for each of us to withdrawal to our own mountain to pray and take this holiday and bend it to our enjoyment. Like the sabbath which was made for us to rest (Exodus 34:21), the holiday is meant to be a time to revel in the holy (spirit) and enjoy some cheer. Amen.

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