A friend of mine called me this morning talking about how people have taken Christ out of Christmas. My response, "Christmas? People have taken Christ out of everything." As I continued our brief discussion, I couldn't help but think of how much we substitute things, traditions, people, staff, church, programs, doctrine, job, family, education, accomplishments, football, houses, cars, clothes, prominence, popularity, electronics, fitness over Christ. It's not just Santa and elves and reindeer and gift giving (or getting) that gets in our way. That's only a sign that we've made the substitution.
Last night, I was watching the Christmas special "Shrek the Halls." Cute little story. Shrek, the ogre, has never celebrated Christmas and doesn't know anything about it. He wants to make their first Christmas special for his new bride and babies, but since he knows nothing of Christmas he gets a book on how to do Christmas. He follows it like a recipe book, doing all the steps. On Christmas eve he gathers his children around the fireplace to read them the Christmas story. The Christmas story he began to read was not the one I was expecting. He read, "Twas the night before Christmas..."
"Wait. That's not the Christmas story," I thought to myself. "Hang on just a minute. That's a substitute. The story of Christmas is Jesus coming to earth as a baby, being born in a stable. Where are the angels and shepherds and wisemen? Shrek, you got the wrong book."
I shouldn't be surprised. The substitution practice has been going on for quite sometime. Just read John's writing in Rev. 2. The church at Ephesus seems to be an active, Bible believing church. They stand up for strict doctrine. Work hard. Endured oppression. Exposed false teachers. Hated evil. Yet, they seem to have lost something along the way. They made hard work and doctrine the center of their worship. Substitution. John says they had forsaken their first love.
How the easy the substitution practice takes over. We get so side tracked on everything in life that we forsake what should be our first love. It's like a sports team that gets lulled into a certain aspect of play and forgets the fundamentals. John encourages us to get our thinking straight and go back to the things we did at first. When it comes down to it, it's about Lordship, putting Christ back at the center.
God, I'm probably just as guilt as the next person of substituting. You certainly deserve the center of my life. It's so easy to start putting other things first, including the urgency of the day. Reclaim your throne in my heart. I don't want to lose my lampstand.
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