Merry Christmas!
It is interesting that I post that this week when 10 days ago I was posting about Chanukkah... For some of you it may seem odd, but for me it is right. I think Chanukkah came first - without it we would have no Messiah, no Savior, no remnant of Israel, perhaps. I don't really say any longer that we wouldn't have any Christmas, but perhaps not even that. Why do I distinguish this? In the past few years I've come to learn that the origins of Christmas really didn't start with Yeshua's birth. Christmas started as the holiday of other religions and got molded by our western cultures to become what it is today. It isn't in the Bible, and Yeshua likely wasn't even born that day. This used to bother me, and I had a time of considering not even wanting to celebrate it because I didn't want to "accidentally" be celebrating a "pagan" holiday. This year, I am realizing, and trying to come to terms with the fact that I am an American Gentile Christian as well as a grafted-into-the-Abrahamic-covenant-Yeshua-follower. I don't even know what that really means half the time, but I'm seeing that there is, indeed, a difference between who I am, and the Jews. It is actually a welcome word for me, as trying to be grafted into a people who don't even know I exist, or let alone want me, was quite confusing to say the least. I do think that one day we will all be one, and love one another, and until then, I will continue to love and pray for everyone, but for now, I am caught somewhere in between.
Anyway, where was I going with this? I think this year, I can embrace Christmas again as a cultural holiday. It is part of my American upbringing and part of my Christian culture. I don't agree with everything about it, but it is part of who I am, so therefore I will let it be.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
3 comments:
So glad you are enjoying who you are and what you believe. I am always blessed to read that.
I hope you had a very Merry Christmas. :)
I am blessed to read this too, Carol :-) You are, as a Christian, grafted into the "family tree" through adoption as sons (and daughters!) through your faith in Jesus Christ...and as such can receive the INHERITANCE. You are a co-heir with Christ...and the significance of that is immense and beyond anything we can fathom. It is all throughout the Old Testament, but fulfilled in Christ, thus the New Testament is ENfolded in the Old, and the Old Testament is UNfolded in the New. Many involved in the HRM miss this, and I don't try to untangle it until they realize that something isn't quite "right" with where they've been. God the Father is betrothed to the Jews, and will NEVER break His covenant with them. God the Son is betrothed to the Church, and we are co-heirs with him. Each of us comes by faith..."believe and you will be saved." But our INHERITANCE is dependent upon our obedience, whether Jew or Gentile. It's all over the Scriptures...the Scriptures, ALL of them, are one unit, and one part cannot be fully comprehended without the other. It is the most amazing book, when we grasp the single, over-arching message of it...mind-blowing!
I must go, so much to do as we're taking a little winter getaway time with friends. We can chat more later! Have a blessed New Year!
~Lori
PS: I loved that bike-sled, too! I wonder if it would be hard to ride...I think I'd be face-first in the snow often as I got used to it, LOL!
I hope you are all well and enjoying some good weather, for Alaska! Thanks for stopping by. Happy new year!
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