Faith can be challenging! Faith is rough when we don’t know how long our faith must sustain us. Faith is even more robust when we struggle to see if we’ve heard from God rightly. Despite these and other challenges, there are some certainties with faith too. Christmas then reminds us that the object of our faith should always be Jesus.
In Luke 2:25-38, we meet Simeon, who received word from the Holy Spirit that he would not die until the coming Messiah. Today if we heard someone make that kind of claim, we’d consider such a person arrogant and pretentious. Yet, Simeon’s proclamation was to confirm the Lord’s coming than elevate himself. He displayed a show of faith.
This Christmas, there will be a lot of emphasis on important things. Yet, are these essential things, be they local traditions, family traditions, new traditions, friends, gifts, etc., yet, how are they pointing to Jesus? How are they enhancing our faith than self?
If we are honest, for many of us, Jesus is not the object of our faith enough during Christmas. Yes, we might attend Christmas services, but we’re too caught up in the culture’s concept of Christmas. That’s not to say we should avoid cultural traditions, but we should remember that no matter how great our traditions might be, Jesus is better.
Looking back then to Simeon, why not start a new tradition. One where – like Simeon – we marvel at God’s faithful plan to ensure His Son would be born. The Son, who is the promise to all humanity. A birth that began a chain reaction of wonders from earthy ministry, to Cruxificiton, to Resurrection, and the birth of His Church.
If, then, God can ensure Simeon’s confidence would be rewarded due to His faithfulness to the Lord, then let’s start a Christmas tradition where we faithfully trust God more. A faith that remembers His plan for us through Jesus every day, no matter our circumstances.
This Christmas, don’t seek to “check off” a Christmas Eve service as an obligation. No, extend your faith to worship the birthed Savior with others both in and out of the church. Doing so, I bet you’ll worship Jesus in more profound and more faithful ways, who again, is better!
Growing our worship is a great tradition to start during Christmas. A tradition based on faith in the greatest gift of all, Christ! His plan would not be thwarted years ago with Simeon or others. Therefore, worship Him each day because his plan won’t be prevented in your life, especially when He remains the object of our faith!
