May 20, 2023

The secular world is actively trying to replace Jesus. They claim to not see Him, and yet all they are doing is pretending. All around us we see the evidence of God, the evidence of Jesus as Lord. Yet the world sees it and hates Him because they refuse to turn to Him in humble brokenness. They fear humility before God because they know they then would have to change. Lets look at the major ways the world has tried to remove Jesus from our everyday lives and especially our holidays.

Christmas: Santa Clause

Jesus is literally the reason for the season; yet, the world has taken a celebration about Salvation, the Messiah, coming to the world, and made it where a magical man from the North Pole comes down the chimney to give good little boys and girls presence. This is all kinds of wrong! Jesus came to save the sinners, yet Santa is rewarding the good people. Jesus was real and fulfilled all prophecies concerning the Messiah, the Word which was with God in the beginning and is God (Jn. 1:1). Santa is based off a Catholic Saint, St. Nicolas, but has grown to be the god of Christmas. People in this generation think more about Santa than they do Jesus. They think more of a fictional character who can do nothing than the Son of God who can save you from or condemn you to eternal damnation.

Easter: Bunny that gives candy

Jesus defeated Death! The Easter Bunny is allufe and hides candy inside eggs. Easter has been downgraded from the greatest thing that ever happened, Jesus defeating death so we can have life eternal, to a fun day for kids to hunt candy.

Creation: Mother Nature

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” John 1:1-3 NKJV

Jesus is the power through which everything was made. When we credit “Mother Nature” for the lovely weather or the amazing life we see, we are slapping the true Creator in the face. How despicable! Jesus makes people mad because He is in authority. People would rather control their own lives and burn in eternal fire rather than humble themselves to fall upon the mercy of God. This world needs to see Jesus! We as Christians need to proclaim His holy name to this world which is sleepwalking to the exit door (David Meece, song).

This leads me to my next point. If you are a Christian and you care more about what you will wear to church or how people will perceive you, then you don’t have your eyes focused on Jesus. Pride keeps our eyes from being fixed on Jesus. How can you walk the path Jesus walked when you’re too busy worrying about the cuts and bruises you might get on the way to the cross. In fact, how can you go to the cross when you’re still busy worrying about this life and the things you might have to lose.

Jesus said give to the poor, sell everything you have and give to the poor (spoke this to the rich young ruler whose idle was his wealth). Jesus said you must hate your life and must lose it if you want to gain true life for all of eternity. This generation doesn’t seem to know how to apply that to their lives. We think giving a small portion of ourselves every week will be sufficient, but in reality we’re just protecting our pride and the things that stroke it which we don’t want to give up.

God is not a feeling. He communicates through His Word, the Bible, and through His Holy Spirit that Jesus sent after He was ascended. Our feelings are deceptive, they tell us to lust, to covet, to lie, and to get angry. We, as Christians, must discern our feelings and judge whether or not they are in truth. Truth is apart of the Armor of God (Eph. 6), it is the belt of truth which we must wear. In truth there is no deception, it is fully aligned with reality; God’s reality.

We must be sober minded, alert and ready to fight against the devils schemes (Eph. 6:10-12), discern for ourselves what the Bible says (not trusting men or women to explain it to us, all we need is the Holy Spirit 2 Tim. 2:7, Col. 1:9), and ready in season and out to explain why we believe the way we do (2 Tim. 4:2). We must be ready with the truth so we can warn others about the judgment to come. All this begins with humbling yourself to fall on your knees before God in complete surrender. It hurts to lay down our pride, but if you are truly saved and you’re ignoring God by not fully surrendering, His discipline will hurt a lot worse (Heb. 12:7).