The uncomfortable truth behind the most celebrated season on earth
“And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not” ~John 1:5
Everyone loves Christmas. The lights, the music, the generosity, the feeling that something good is in the air. For a few weeks the world slows down just enough to pretend peace is possible. But the moment Christmas starts asking why it exists the mood shifts. Because the real Christmas is not a fairy tale or a feeling. It is a declaration. The Bible says the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not ~John 1:5. Christmas is loved as long as it stays sentimental. It is resisted the moment it tells the truth about sin, authority, and why God had to come at all.
Modern Christmas is loud, crowded, and expensive. It is lights on houses, music in stores, packages under trees, and pressure to feel cheerful whether you are or not. The world treats Christmas like a seasonal mood. Buy more. Eat more. Distract yourself more. Jesus gets a mention, but He is pushed to the edge, like a background decoration.
The Bible presents something far different.
Scripture does not open Christmas with nostalgia. It opens with need. A decree forces Mary and Joseph onto the road. There is no room at the inn. The Son of God enters the world with nowhere to lay His head ~Luke 2:1-7. That alone confronts modern Christmas. God did not enter abundance. He entered lack.
Today Christmas is sold as comfort. In Scripture, Christmas is about humility. The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us ~John 1:14. God did not send a message. He came Himself. He stepped into a fallen world that did not ask for Him and would later reject Him.
Modern Christmas centers on self. How do I feel. What did I get. Is my house decorated enough. Biblical Christmas centers on God’s action. When the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law ~Galatians 4:4-5. Christmas is not about atmosphere. It is about redemption.
The world treats Christmas as harmless and sentimental. Scripture treats it as dangerous to pride because it declares that salvation is not achieved, earned, or deserved. It is given. “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” ~Ephesians 2:8. Pride hates that. Pride wants credit. Pride wants control. Pride wants a share of the glory.
That is why many love Christmas but resist its meaning. The announcement did not go to kings or influencers. It went to shepherds, men watching sheep in the dark. The angel said, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people ~Luke 2:10. God bypassed the powerful and spoke to the overlooked. That is still how He works.
Modern Christmas avoids words like sin, repentance, and judgment. The Bible does not. The angel told Joseph, Thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins ~Matthew 1:21. Not from inconvenience. Not from low self-esteem. From sins. Christmas makes no sense unless sin is real and deadly.
The world loves a baby in a manger but rejects a King with authority. Scripture never separates the two. Isaiah says, Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder ~Isaiah 9:6. Christmas announces rule. Christ did not come to be admired. He came to reign.
Even the reactions in Matthew expose the divide. Wise men worship. Herod rages ~Matthew 2:1-16. That same split still exists. Some bow. Others resist. Psalm 2 already told us how this would go. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing ~Psalm 2:1.
Here is the hard truth. Modern Christmas tries to keep Jesus small so no one has to change. Biblical Christmas declares that God stepped into history to demand a response. The light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not ~John 1:5.
Christmas according to the world is about celebration without submission. Christmas according to Scripture is about God invading a broken world to rescue sinners and claim their allegiance.
So the question is not whether you celebrate Christmas. The question is whether you believe it. Will you treat Jesus as a tradition, or will you receive Him as Lord. As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God ~John 1:12.
That is the real Christmas. No tinsel. No pretending. Just God with us, calling sinners to repentance, faith, and obedience.
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