Paradigm starts back up this semester beginning with a series entitled “Lost” by Michael Kelley. Bruce and I met Michael this summer in Glorietta, NM where he co-led Collegiate Week with David Platt. Michael wrote the Bible study series “Tough Sayings of Jesus” which is being used by some of our LIFE group classes on Sunday mornings. He is an avid blogger, so I encourage you to check out his blog (click here) and come to Paradigm this week! Thursday at 8pm at First Baptist Church!
With the BCS National Championship Game tonight, there is no better time to begin a new segment on the blog.
BLOGnation.
BLOGnation (yes, it is a play off of ESPN’s Sportsnation…but way cooler), is where this blog’s blog readers meet and can have their say! BLOGnation will feature polls of questions connected to current events, headlines, trivia, blog posts and total randomness. I’m looking forward to see how this works!
That being said, let’s get started with the innagural BLOGnation:
Thanks for participating in BLOGnation!
Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunn, my two favorite characters from my favorite movie (I’ll give you ten bonus points if you can name that movie…if you can’t, well then we probably shouldn’t talk anymore). Anyway, what was I saying?
Oh yeah.
Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunn, my two favorite characters from my favorite movie. I doubt that anyone had as much of an influence on my life growing up than these two characters.
Hold that thought…
September 16, 1999 my family grew from four members to five with the adoption of a brand new baby boy. He was a cute little guy…all cuddly and such. Anyway, he was (and still is now that I think about it) a miniature poodle. The first official family pet (there were a few roly-polies and a stray cat along the way) that we had owned since my previous dog, Cinnamon, who was sent to the “Happy Dog Farm” when I was about 5 years old. Anyway, with new family pets, come new responsibilities. The first responsibility I was given was naming the little guy.
Lloyd Harry Christmas Wadlow.
Lloyd Christmas + Harry [Dunn] + The family name (of course).
Here’s some footage from Lloyd’s Christmas (no pun intended)…
This week’s LINK OF THE WEEK might change your life…..seriously. Check it out, go to Handy Dandy Links!
Also, check out the new book I am currently reading! Click here!
Sorry for the delay between posts. Now that holiday travels are over for me, I should be able to be consistent. It is now time for the third and final part of “How Would Christ Choose to Celebrate Christmas.” If you have not yet read the first two parts, check them out first:
How Would Christ Choose to Celebrate Christmas (Part 1)
How Would Christ Choose to Celebrate Christmas (Part 2)
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So, if Jesus Christ were able to plan his own birthday celebration (a.k.a. Christmas) in 2009, how would He choose to celebrate it?
Let me first say this: This is not necessarily a study to determine what we should or shouldn’t be doing on Christmas day. As far as I know, Jesus didn’t really leave any specific instructions on how to celebrate His special day 2,000 years later. However, if we are truly wanting to celebrate the birth and life of our Savior whose life was defined by humility, love, selflessness, and self-sacrifice, I can’t help but wonder, “Are the traditions we follow on Christmas day really doing that?” Are the traditions that we follow on Christmas day really celebrating and paying honor to the birth and life of Jesus Christ?
If you were to look at Matthew 2, you would find the story of the 3 kings (you may know them as the “magi” or the “three wise men”) who came from “afar” to shower baby Jesus with gifts. Somehow these guys recognized that somebody important had just been born and in order to show him reverence they traveled a long way just so they could give him some gifts. They were pretty cool gifts for a baby to receive back in that day too! Gold, incense, and myrrh. That would be like getting cash, some really high dollar cologne, and a gift card to Express (by the way, I didn’t even know what Express was until this Christmas).
That’s how we know the story to go, right? The kings show up, give him some gifts, and they leave. The one part of the story we hardly ever take note of though is the part where it says, “On coming to the house, they saw the child (Jesus) with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him.” (Matt. 2:11) For the kings, that’s what this day was about. That’s what the gifts were about. They worshiped Christ.
Obviously, we can’t literally take gifts to Jesus on His birthday like the three kings did (or like we would for anyone else on their birthday for that matter). However, I want to propose a round about way in which we can almost literally give gifts to Christ in celebration of His birth.
In Matthew 25:34-40, Jesus tells a parable. There is a lot of depth to this parable and some major implications that come out of it as well, however I want to simply point out one aspect. The people who the King (Jesus) allows into His kingdom were rewarded because they fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, gave shelter to the stranger, clothed the naked, looked after the sick, and visited the prisoner. The King tells the people, “…whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Essentially, these people were bringing the King gifts (food, drink, shelter, clothes, etc… but most importantly love) everytime they ministered to somebody’s needs! Incredible! Even though we can’t literally take a gift (like gold, incense, or myrrh) to Jesus, we CAN!
I fear that our celebrations of Christmas have drifted away from actually celebrating the birth of Christ. Don’t misunderstand me, Christmas is a great holiday. Seeing family and friends, giving and receiving gifts, and sharing meals together are all great things. However, the question I can’t help but land on this post-holiday season is this:
There is no more important birthday that we could ever celebrate than that of a King and a Savior, could it be time that we reconsider how we are celebrating Christmas?
Essentially, Christmas is the celebration of Jesus Christ’s birthday. Whenever I (or anyone else) have a birthday, I get to chose the way I want it to be celebrated. What would Christmas look like if it were celebrated the way Christ chose?
How would Christ choose to celebrate Christmas?
That’s the question we landed on at the end of “How Would Christ Choose to Celebrate Christmas (Part 1).” Let Part 2 begin…
Think with me for a moment…
What has been the best, most memorable birthday experience you’ve ever had? Why was it so great? Who was there? What did you do? What did you get?
For me, this one is easy! When I was in 3rd or 4th grade I was obsessed with two things, baseball and pizza. For my birthday that year we had a pizza party with a baseball theme. It was awesome (Anyone up for a baseball themed pizza party? My house 6 o’clock…be there)! All I can really remember is me and my friends watched highlight reels of Nolan Ryan (if you don’t know who Nolan Ryan is…well, we can’t be friends) and we ate pizza. A lot of pizza. More pizza than you could ever imagine a group of 3rd graders eating! We also had these pizza flavored chips (they were disgusting) with our pizza. Like I said, it was awesome.
Your birthday is your special day. My birthday is my special day (well, not really because I have to share mine with my sister…crud mom! You seriously had to birth me on the same day as her?!), and because birthdays are special days, the birthday boy/girl gets to choose to spend it how they want to spend it (i.e. baseball themed pizza party). Our birthday parties are typically centered around: what we like, what interests us, what our passions are, what would most please us, etc… When people throw birthday parties for others, they plan them around those things as best as they can.
So here’s the 10 bajillion dollar question…
If you were to plan Christ’s birthday, what would that day look like? Who would you invite and why? What would you do and why?
The purpose of this question is to get you to think about how you celebrate Christmas (a.k.a. Christ’s birthday). As you think through the questions above, think from the perspective that Christmas has never been celebrated before. There are no traditions for you to follow. You have a clean slate to start with. Now…
If you were to plan a day to celebrate the birth and life of Jesus Christ, what would that day look like?
To be continued…
Last week’s link of the week was Advent Conspiracy (click here). Advent Conspiracy is partnered with Living Water International to try and accomplish the task of providing the world with clean drinking water.
For more information on this week’s LINK OF THE WEEK, go to Handy Dandy Links.
This year, on the night of Christmas, I found myself sitting in my room making a list of all of the things that I did on Christmas day. Here’s the list:
After making the list, I couldn’t help but look at it and feel that something was wrong. I couldn’t help but ask the question:
What is wrong with this picture?
Christmas day is the day that we have set aside to celebrate the birth and life of Jesus Christ. It is the day that we have set aside to celebrate the beginning of the life of our selfless, self-sacrificing, humble, loving Savior and yet I spent the whole day indulging myself in (when I look at the list above, what appears to be) selfish, self-serving, meaningless activity without hardly even once thinking about or mentioning the name of the One for whom we have set aside Christmas day for! The truth of the matter is, this is how many of us spend Christmas, which leads me to ask the question:
What is wrong with this picture?
If we are going to continue calling December 25th, “Christmas,” we need to seriously reconsider how we are choosing to spend Christmas day. Better yet, if we are going to be advocates for “keeping Christ in Christmas,” wouldn’t you agree that our stance should be about more than just keeping “Christ” in the name Christmas? Don’t you think anyone’s stance on this issue should be more focused on keeping Christ in the celebration of Christmas? When I look at the list above, it resembles nothing even close to a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. If anything, it resembles a celebration of my own life! The way that many of us choose to celebrate Christmas is hardly any different from the way that those who oppose our stance to “keep Christ in Christmas” celebrate the holiday.
So, if we were to actually celebrate the “Christ” in Christmas, what would that look like?
Essentially, Christmas is the celebration of Jesus Christ’s birthday. Whenever I (or anyone else) have a birthday, I get to chose the way I want it to be celebrated. What would Christmas look like if it were celebrated the way Christ chose?
How would Christ choose to celebrate Christmas?
To be continued…
Merry Christmas everyone! I will be taking a few days off from blogging while I’m spending some time with the family…until then, I hope you all have a very merry and white Christmas!
Check out our new Flickr photo page for Paradigm! Go to Handy Dandy Links!
If you have pictures from Paradigm or Paradigm events that you would like to put on Paradigm’s Flickr, email them to me and I’ll put ‘em up! Hopefully our Flickr page will be linked to paradigmbiblestudy.com in the next couple of days so that it can be easily accessed.
Heck yes!
Austin W.
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