These Are My JOTtings...

What is the Real Purpose of Christmas?

It's two weeks, until Christmas Eve!

My heart is already wondering, "How do I brace for impact in the days, that follow Christmas Day?"

"Brace for impact?" Seems a bit strange, doesn't it?
All of the build-up to December 25 has been followed by a very hard let-down on December 26 throughout the years, if there is not something else planned to soften the blow. (New Year's Eve has been an acceptable remedy.)

I come from a background in which Christmas is the greatest day of the year, except, of course, for Resurrection Sunday Morning, which is rarely, if ever, the same day from year to year. However, in recent years I have come to regard "Easter" as Secret Christmas because "The best Gift of Christmas is opened on Resurrection Sunday Morning!"

Therefore, the static balance of Christmas Day being December 25 has been comforting for me throughout my lifetime.

I guess in some ways Christmas has been like a big furry teddy bear for me.
Maybe, it's like Linus' security blanket.

Yet, is that the purpose of Christmas?

Jesus, the Christ was born in Bethlehem.
Jesus' parents had no reservations in the local inn.
Jesus met the world amid the smells of musty hay, animal eliminations, bleating, baaing and other barnyard sounds. (Although, it is arguable, that the animals were all quiet, when Jesus was born, since He tended to have that effect on His world, regardless of His age.)

A few scruffy shepherds followed a star to greet the newborn King, but that was it.
Mary had no epidural.
Joseph wasn't a trained obstetrician.
Nobody wrote down the actual day on a birth certificate. Therefore, December 25th has always been the arbitrary day to celebrate His birth, since that date is probably the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. This means The Light of the world arrived on the year's darkest day.

(Have you ever thought about that? Jesus wouldn't be able to enter the universities of the world, today, because he had no way to produce a humanly-valid birth certificate in order to start matriculation. WOW! The wisest man of existence would not be allowed into universities of higher education! That seems to be happening, anyway.)

The GOD, Who created everything in existence started His Earthly existence in obscurity.
Jesus lived in poverty in the poor town of Nazareth. Yet, His purpose was to bring everlasting wealth to anyone, who would believe Him.

Is Christmas about the gifts?
Is Christmas the greatest Gift of the Great Giver?

No doubt, it is the latter. (John 3:16)