Recently the city of Portland had a tree lighting ceremony, but it was not a Christmas tree lighting ceremony.
An article in a magazine called That Oregon Life reported: “Thousands packed the square Friday night to watch the lighting of the 75-foot evergreen, decorated with 10,000 bulbs, but the word ‘Christmas’ was never mentioned by organizers, hosts, or featured speakers throughout the event.”
The mayor was there, as was Santa, and also an activist that tried to lead the people in chants of “free Palestine.” But no mention of Christmas.
Online reactions to the event: “They can’t even say Christmas tree in Portland. They call it ‘the tree,'” Another added, “Why does everything have to be so divisive??!!” And another: “It’s a Christmas tree, it’s always been a Christmas tree, and it will always be a Christmas tree.”
Even in New York City, when they had the prominent tree lightings on Wall Street and the Rockefeller Center (neither place particularly known for its religiosity) they still called them Christmas trees.
But the leaders of the city of Portland could not bring themselves to do it. I think Portland takes pride in making its liberalism industrial-strength.
It’s not just Portland. There seems to be an unspoken movement that tries to scrub Christ out of Christmas while trying to keep the warm, cozy (and profitable) accessories associated with it.
An example: Starbucks. There was a time that Starbucks (perhaps they are still doing it) seemed to milk the holiday season for all it was worth, using euphemisms like ‘holiday’ and ‘season’, without saying “Merry Christmas.” But once I did see a Starbucks with a prominent “Merry Christmas” sign on its front door…it was in communist Vietnam! It is ironic and unfortunate that in our country with so much history and presence of the gospel that we should be trying to take Christ out of Christmas.
This practice does not strike me as wicked as much as foolish and self-defeating. It takes out the most important thing, the reminder that Christ is the greatest gift. He should be the part of Christmas we keep the most.
This was underscored by my reading of the Old Testament, most recently in the book of Leviticus. It makes one really appreciate how good we have it now that Christ has come into the world.
Leviticus tells of the stern, strict law, particularly about sacrifices that would atone for different kinds of sins. It is surprising that the sins for which sacrifices and rituals covered were almost all for unintentional sins, not deliberate sins (though I found one exception concerning defrauding of a neighbor in chapter 6). Almost no provision for overt, willful sin is made. It looks pretty bleak. What do you do if you committed a deliberate sin? It would make one tremble in uncertainty in the presence of a Holy God.
Notice that David, after he committed his sins of adultery and murder, did not go the priests to make an offering. He couldn’t; there was no offering for what he did, as he says in his great psalm of confession, Psalm 51: “You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings,” (vs. 16). He had no choice but to throw himself on the mercy of God. He did, and God forgave his sin. His guilt was forgiven, but he had much earthly trouble after that.
The point is that there the law was inadequate to deal with his sins. There were unanswered questions, a lack of certainty and a sense of inadequacy in that old system.
But God never intended that system to be permanent. It was transitory. It had its time and its time is over. God bought something much better when He sent Christ into the world. We now have a Savior who brought an atonement that is more than adequate for every kind of sin. No more reason for uncertainty.
That’s the best gift. We should celebrate that, not scrub it out of our greatest holiday.
I believe God deliberately made the Old Testament rituals tough, exacting and incomplete so that it would produce yearning in the Israelites as they looked for the greater deliverance of the Savior. And for us, it should produce gratitude as we live on this side of Christ’s birth, death and resurrection. We have that record of the old law in our Bibles so that we can see how good we have it now.
The book of Hebrews makes our present advantage very clear. Jesus is greater than the Old Testament priesthood and sacrificial system. It says, “Now there have been many of those [Old Covenant] priests, since death prevented them from continuing in office; but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them,” (Hebrews 7:23-25).
“He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world,” (1 John 2:2). Everyone should be full of gratitude at the great and accessible salvation now provided and revealed. This is better than any Christmas gift.
We live in the age David longed for and the prophets yearned to see. We have full and free forgiveness available. Why would anyone want to sanitize Christ out of Christmas?
Maybe next year Portland will call it a Christmas tree.