Christmas: Fighting Death and All His Friends

I'm struggling with Christmas this year, for various reasons.

I've always hated commercialism. Sentimentality is bothersome too, perhaps this year more than before. But most of all, I'm sick of the sugar-coating that goes on inside the church. 

We're leaving out the power of the Gospel for a happy, warm-fuzzy feeling that makes a good singing and drama program. 

Let us not forget that His birth was promised with the arrival of sin - that with the promise of hope, came the promise of battle and pain. 

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will crush your head, and you will strike His heel. Genesis 3:15

The Christmas story is not a story of happy, carefree people and cute soft fluffy sheep. Jesus was born in a stable - a place slimed with dirt and sweat and blood and tears and manure. The Nativity is a story of fear and hope, betrayal and love, enmity and adoration, terror and peace, death and life. 

It is a story of war. 

The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. ...And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. ...Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war against the rest of her offspring—those who obey God's commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus. Revelation 12: 4, 7, 17

We get these happy sentimental ideas about Christmas, but Scripture has no such ambiguity. 

The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. I John 3:8

Or, as my Bible teacher Jeremy Gregory equated, "to destroy 'death and all his friends,'" - disease, famine, abuse, slavery, neglect, injustice. The wrong created by the Fall is ours to redeem through the victory that Jesus has won.

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. I Corinthians 15:56-58

And what last words does Paul impart to the church at Rome?

The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you. Romans 16: 20

So maybe Christmas can leave us feeling empty and unfulfilled because we don't understand the role we're called to play in the story. We're called to fight death and all his friends, because that is why Christ appeared. That is why He became God-in-flesh. As God has redeemed us, we are called to redeem - not that we have any power in of ourselves, but that we know Christ. It is Christ whose heel was stricken by the serpent, and it is Christ who was to crush his head. Yet we have the victory of Christ when we are in Him. 

But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father." So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. Galatians 4:4-7

The Glorious Fourth

“It ought to be commemorated as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more. You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Day’s Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not.” John Adams, July 1776

I have a lot of mixed emotions about holidays. July 4th, Easter, Christmas, you name it. (Of course, my feelings are not so mixed regarding Hallmark Days like Valentine's.) It seems our culture has an uncanny ability to take a good event with deep original meaning and turn it into something worthless. Sometimes my inability to see past cute reindeer, bouncy bunnies, and fun picnics ruin the whole thing, even the parts that are good and noble.

I had fun today. Family, friends, food, fun, fireworks (and a little bit of alliteration). But it seems to me that most of it was really missing the point.

During the fireworks, I couldn't help but think that this generation of Americans is extremely unique. The deep bass sound of rockets and explosions bring mental images of beauty and fun, not terror. Pick any other nation in the world - from troubled eastern Europe to the Middle East to Asia, Africa, or the drug wars of Latin America - and the sound we know as fireworks is known as death, war, and destruction.

Go back two or three hundred years on our own American soil. A blinding flash of light is the last thing a soldiers sees before burning schrapnel tears apart his flesh. Boom! Earth and rock fly upward as fortifications are slowly deconstructed, volley by volley. Rat-a-tat-tat! The steady sound of the drum draws men forward into battle, over the bodies of fallen comrades as they face the flash of enemy fire and artillery. On the sea, the great kaboom leaves a gaping hole in the hull, ushering churning water in to take possession of the vessel commissioned to fight for freedom. Just miles away, the dreadful boom of cannon brings fear to women and children, left to wonder if the day's battle will bring the death of husband, father, brother, cousin, or friend.

Now, a distance bang draws eager children to the windows, and begins a contest to locate the pretty colors first. A star! A ring! A sizzling sparkler! Yet none tell of the horror of war, nor the struggle for freedom.

July 4, 1776 was not a day of celebration. It was a day of solemn commitment, when men determined a course of liberty or death. The signers pledged "their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor," because they knew "if they did not hang together, they would all hang separately."

We've lost that solemness because we have never had to fight to defend it on our shores. But that is all the more reason that the Fourth should be a day to fast and remember and repent, rather than recklessly celebrate that of which we do not know the cost.

Yes, we should celebrate, but we must not ever forget why we may.

Battle Cries

I often wonder about the things that excite my heart and stir my passion.

The call, "For NARNIA!!!" sends chills down my spine and makes me long for a sword in my hand and clinking mail to shield my heart.

I long to ride behind Thomas of Hunter, waging war against the Horde, defending the Forests for Elyon.

Even lesser things -things with no resemblance to my true Home- make me swell with patriotic pride and a longing to fight and defend. Remember the Alamo! Give me liberty or give me death! Truth, justice, and the American way! No taxation with representation! The South will rise again! To infinity and beyond!

Okay, I kid. In fact, I completely lied on the last few...

My point is stories inspire me and impact me on a deep level...which is a good thing. Yet my loyalty and longing to fight for Narnia doesn't carry over to the war in which I'm currently engaged...which is a bad thing.

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete. I Corinthians 10:3-6

The struggle to wake up early, read my Bible, make my little brother a sandwich, then go study invisible lines and imaginary numbers and unknown letters while being nice to the jerk sitting next to me isn't nearly as appealing as the clash of swords and the thunder of hooves driving the enemy from the field to defend my home, family, and freedom.

Obedience. Attitude. Prayer. Thoughts. Words. Perseverance. Perseverance in the little things.

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death– even death on a cross! Philippians 2:5-8

The Christian life certainly has the big battles, the glorious charges, the moments on the mountaintop when the enemy is clearly defined and victory is in sight. But a lot of life is in the standing, in the waiting, in picking up the cross again each day. These "little" fights are often harder, in some ways, than the big campaigns. These build endurance amidst suffering, and perseverance and character and hope.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then. Ephesians 6: 12-3

Stand. My youth pastor reminded me of this today. "If you're not intentional about your spiritual walk, you'll suffer - but you won't stay the same." I fight to be able to stand- fighting may not seem like I'm moving forward or gaining ground. But if I cease to stand, I fall.

So may the stories remind us that we are called to fight each day, even when it doesn't seem like we're fighting anything. And may the battle cries dim in comparison to the encouraging call and command of our Warrior King.