Posted Under: Everyday Christian,personal
How to practically make Jesus the reason for the season this Christmas
The yuletide part of the year has come upon us again! But despite all the feverish holiday preparations, decorations and festivity anxieties going on, I doubt if unbelievers generally actually get a better chance of hearing about Jesus now than during the rest part of the year anymore. Christmas being about publishing Jesus and the gospel seems to be a little old school in the minds of most folks and now people just observe festivity for the sake of it, or for the sake of the holiday, and the church appears too occupied to notice.
I think that the religious sentiment of celebrating the birth of Jesus on a chosen date may not be bad at all, but I don’t think that alone makes Jesus the reason for the season or makes the season about Jesus, assuming that Jesus was actually even born on the 25th of December. I’m not complaining of Christmas Carol songs that don’t say anything about Jesus or the fact that decorating churches do not edify anybody. But rather I’m thinking this can be a season where we would intensify evangelism. Everyday of a believer’s life must be about Jesus, but then this yuletide is a season that even unbelievers acknowledge Christianity, at least socially.
Other obvious advantages include that it happens to be a holiday period; people tend to stay more at home and may therefore be more available to visit; some people tend to go out more and it may be easier to invite them to well organized church programs where they can be ministered to specially; most tend to be more tolerant with the phone and so why don’t we prayerfully send them text messages or give them calls, taking the opportunity to minister to them. Also now, some tend to give more time to the media and internet, this is another channel that Christians can use more deliberately through intelligent programming of edifying content, as well as, personal profiles on social sites(e.g. facebook), blog posts and advert spaces.
Well you may have better ideas to share but the best we can do is to go out there and take any opportunity there is to reach out to friends, family and neighbors. God bless you with a wonderful Christmas and a happy new year in Jesus name.
