Welcome to Pastor Jack Buckley's weekly blog and podcast.
You have three ways to hear his weekly message:
- Read Pastor Jack's GODblog.
- Listen now to an audio of the scripture reading and Pastor Jack's sermon.
- Listen anytime. You choose the time and place. Download Pastor Jack's GODcast to your MP3 player.
Monday, December 07, 2009
How To Get Ready For Christmas
 Malachi 3:1-4; Luke 1:68-79
"But didn't we just carve pumpkins?" So asks the guy to his wife when she says it's time to go shopping for Christmas, in a commercial that aired the day after Halloween. The one that rediscovers the virtues of lay-away purchasing as a shopper's escape hatch in these trying economic times.
[Wizened voice] Why, Sonny, I can remember when Christmas ads and store decorations popped into view only after Thanksgiving, the day Santa rode into town atop the last and most important float in the big parade. Next thing you know they'll be smuggling in the cards and wrapping paper, the tinsel and colored lights, somewhere between Labor Day and the autumn equinox. You just wait and see!
Well, it's one thing to get all curmudgeonly about the ways we've commercialized almost to death what started out as a religious holiday (holy day). It's also pretty much a lost cause.
Much better, I'd say, to honor the power of silver bells, candy canes, douglas firs, presents and all to lift our spirits even as they deflate our wallets. And to give that nod to sentimental materialism while focusing our eyes on the Advent Wreath, and tuning our ears to the Advent Scriptures that prepare our hearts to celebrate Christmas in the spirit of Christ.
The Advent season spans the four weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's an ages-old time for re-enacting the world's long, dark, cold wait for the coming of Christ the Light of the World. Candles figure big, the four purple ones that ring an evergreen wreath, and the tall white one that symbolizes Christ himself. And the selected Bible readings take a long view, looking back to Hebrew prophecies and looking ahead to the second coming, locating the birth of Jesus right at the heart of the biblical timeline.
Though there's a real tension here between secular and sacred, the two don't necessarily contradict each other. Some wise person has pointed out that all truth is God's Truth. Someone else has asked, "Why should the devil have all the good tunes?" I say let's celebrate Christmas every which way we can -- with happy songs and bright lights and cups of cheer, all pleasant corollaries of the Bible's themes of love and joy and grace and peace. All of that wrapped up in the sweet story of a newborn baby boy out there in a remote outpost of the mighty Roman Empire.
On Sunday I had more to say on the subject. To check it out for yourself...
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
5:09 PM
<< Home
|
|
 |
|
|
