Christmas Aversion

Anti-Christmas activities have reached a new low in the U.S. and Netherlands. We would expect it from the Netherlands, where anything goes, but not the U.S.

In Amsterdam, a Dutch gay group is planning a “Pink Christmas” which, for the first time, will feature a live manger scene with two Josephs and two Marys. This perverse manger scene is to tout the idea that expands choices for homosexual men and women and is a “wink” at heterosexual assumptions. This is really nothing irregular since Holland legalized gay marriage in 2001. Predictably, a Christian organization reacted saying, “By putting Mary and Joseph down as homosexuals, a cracked human fantasy is being tacked on to history from the Bible,” and urged the city to reject it.

When basic God-ordained marriage between one man and one woman is broadened to include formations of whatever genders and numbers, the general order of society and the health of such a country are severely jeopardized. Such degradation may be freedom’s leading edge of social progress, but it’s the trailing edge of society in decline.

Paul probed the fall in Romans chapter 1: “…because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools … Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves … For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality … (Romans 1:21, 22, 24, 26-29a – emphasis mine)

In the Greek, “fools” in this text is “moraino” from which we get the term “moron.” And speaking of fools, the Psalmist said twice, “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, They have done abominable works, There is none who does good.” (Psalm 14:1; 53:1)

In King David’s day, atheists hid their unbelief in their hearts, but in the Washington State Capitol building, they have publicly proclaimed it in a Christmas display area. Atheists from the Freedom From Religion Foundation obtained permission to place an anti-religion message as a part of the holiday displays. The signboard reads: “There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens our hearts and enslaves our minds.” Incredible!

Modest atheists would admit that there may be some kind of God somewhere in the universe. Since die-hard atheists seem to assert there is no God at all, that would indicate they themselves are somehow omnipresent (everywhere present in the universe at once) in order to know that. This would qualify them as God and make their atheism absurd. The ultimate fall of Eve in Eden was to buy into Satan’s lie as Gen. 3:4-5 says. “Then the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’” Ordinary men in unbelief have inevitably sought “god-likeness.”

Someone has noted that a true atheist impact could be considerable if all atheists would volunteer to work on Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. Further, they might stop dating their checks and legal papers with 2008, which marks the year since the birth of Jesus. They should seek legislation to rename scores of cities and towns around the country such as Nazareth and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, two biblical towns figuring in the birth story of Christ. Los Angeles would have to be renamed since it means “city of angels.” Corpus Christi, “the body of Christ,” also has to go.

A Christmas defender of the manger scene placed near the atheists’ pathetic statement of ignorance in the Washington State capitol said, “I think the manger scene speaks for itself.” It has spoken out for centuries, and the Babe of Bethlehem, who was the Christ of Calvary, became the Lord of glory and is personal Savior who lives in the hearts of millions around the world.

Phillips Brooks, a Philadelphia minister, visited ancient Bethlehem on Christmas Eve in 1865 and wrote a famous Christmas carol in 1868 after returning home. Its truth stands despite atheists’ ignorance:

O little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie;
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by:
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

The manger still speaks for itself.

Dave Virkler