
The gifts have been opened, and the exchanges of the ones we don’t want have begun.
The holiday trees are dry, and discarded at curbsides for waste disposal.
Many people are stIll consuming the rich food and drink of the holidays, as they make New Year’s resolutions to diet and exercise “later.”
I cannot speak for anyone else, but the crass materialism and commercialism of the holiday trouble me.
Look behind the façade of the occasion, and consider its origin. Take away Santa Claus, reindeer, toys for those of all ages, and the long celebration that begins before Thanksgiving and ends in January — and look at the story of the One Whose life is supposedly held up for honor. A good read of the first two chapters of Matthew’s Gospel and the second chapter of Luke’s Gospel is in order.
There one finds the beginning of what has been called The Greatest Story Ever Told, as the title of a Hollywood — yes, Hollywood! — film of yesteryear brought the biography of Jesus Christ to many.
Another much shorter but no less memorable tribute was penned by James Allan Francis, a Baptist minister, nearly a century ago.
“He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village, where he worked in a carpenter shop until He was 30. Then for three years, He was an itinerant preacher. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family or owned a home. He didn’t go to college. He never visited a big city. He never traveled more than two hundred miles from the place He was born. He did none of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself.
“He was only 33 when the tide of public opinion turned against Him. His friends ran away. One of them denied Him. He was turned over to His enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves.
“While He was dying, His executioners gambled for His garments, the only property He had on earth. When He was dead, He was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend. Nineteen centuries have come and gone, and today He is the central figure of the human race.
“All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on this earth as much as that one solitary life.”
And truly, the One Who taught us to love God and one another is a model for many and an enemy for others. In the two millennia since His life, death, resurrection and ascension, His kingdom still stands — despite the assaults from the gates of hell and its commercialism.