Well, Christmas Day is gone and everywhere one looks, there are faint reminders that it has come and gone. The Christmas songs have disappeared, and decorations are coming down.
News reports revealed that Super Saturday sales (Saturday before Christmas) reached $34.4 billion, the biggest single day in U.S. retail history.
Christmas Day may be over, but many people will be reminded of that day of the cost of Christmas when credit card bills come in January.
I’ve lived enough years recognize the true cost of Christmas has changed. There was a time when a large majority of people connected the 25th day of December with the birth of Christ. Today, that has flipped as the majority of people today have little to no knowledge of the meaning of the day. How is that possible?
The current and upcoming generations of the West are growing up in a post-Christian culture. They are also growing up in nations where their families are often several generations removed from any resemblance of Christian belief. It is not only that they do not know anything about Christianity, but it is also that they do not know what they do not know.
The Christian Post reported the findings in a recent survey”
- 38% of Britons between the ages of 21 and 28 did not know the identity of the baby in Christmas Nativity scenes.
- 37% could identify neither Joseph nor Mary.
- Fewer than 10% could name the gifts given to the Lord Jesus by the wise men (gold, frankincense, and myrrh)
- Some even believed that Santa Claus was somehow linked to the Christmas story.
It’s hard to fathom that one of the greatest Christian empires in the history of the world is now populated by men and women who do not even know that the Christmas story is about the birth of Jesus!
The cost of Christmas is not about gifts purchased in a store or online. The present-day cost of Christmas is the loss of an essential faith. It is also the cultural loss that robs Western civilization of one of its foundational stories and eliminates a fundamental part of Western identity. To be unaware of the beliefs that influenced prior generations for over a thousand years is to be cut off from our own history in an extraordinary way. It is to ensure that we simply cannot understand why things happened the way that they did, and to be crippled in our ability to analyze the present and plan for the future.
It is also a stark reminder that civilization is an incredibly fragile thing. To no longer believe in the historical accuracy of the Bible, or the basic fundamentals of Christianity is one thing. However, to not be able of identifying the Child in the manger as Jesus, comes at what cost?
It’s time to step back for a moment and realize that in a lifetime, everything that previous generations took for granted can be lost. The very faith that sent thousands of missionaries to endure unknown dangers in distant lands, can be erased by not understanding the true meaning of Christmas.
The true cost of Christmas is found in one bible verse: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)
So, when you’re paying off the bills from this past December 25th, let’s remember and not lose sight of the true cost of Christmas—God gave.
Pass the message along—all year long!
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