In our small little family, we don’t often make a big deal of most occasions like birthdays, anniversaries etc. We often remember these occasions and celebrate them in a quiet way at home with the rest of the family. However, there is one special occasion of the year that we will celebrate and today, we are celebrating what is the most exciting holiday of the year for us – Christmas.
Most of us have already been caught in its spirit. We have been busy shopping, getting the tree up and decorated, doing all the wonderful things this season signifies for us. All around us, the lights are going up and Christmas decorations have been put up in stores.
But as I sit thinking about the meaning of Christmas late this evening, I realize that its meaning has changed many times for me.
I remember, when I was very much younger, believing in Santa Claus and his elves working busily at the North Pole making all the wonderful toys that we were going to receive on that magical day called Christmas. Mom probably didn’t know I believed in Santa – she was too busy working. I think I believed in Santa as a means of escaping from my daily experiences as a child growing up in the family that I did.
As I grew slightly older, someone told me that Christmas was not about Santa Claus and Santa Claus was not real. He was only a figure with a big round belly and a full white beard. But he did not exist. He was only in my imagination. At first that crushed me. How else could I explain how despite being good some of the time, I did not get my wishes fulfilled? It also explained the Chinese, Malay and Indian Santas we saw in the stores.. some of them were stick-thin and they looked like Santa had just a famine at the North Pole.
Suddenly Christmas began to take on a new meaning. I had to adjust to this hard fact.
I never thought too much about the true meaning of Christmas. It was just a time of the year. More often than not, Mom, Sis and I somehow set aside our constant bickering and we seemed to be happy. Mum would invite friends to our place or we would be invited to the houses of friends. I got to have sumptuous meals of delicious food and sweet things. We bought, gave gifts to others and received gifts from others.
As I grew older, we started attending church and I began to learn the true meaning of Christmas. I went to Sunday School and we learnt the Bible story of the birth of Jesus. But the presents and the fun activities continued so things didn’t change much as far as i was concerned.
As a teenager, Christmas was a time to get together with church friends. We’d go Christmas carolling at the homes of various members of the church. We’d get a peek into their Christmas celebrations, partake of the sumptuous food they set aside in preparation for our visit. We’d stay up late, chatting with one another. It was also a time that called for more immediate action, on my part, to be more obvious about the crushes I had on various members of the opposite sex each year.
As a young adult, Christmas became a time to go out with friends and work colleagues since I was no longer going to church. We’d hit various nightspots, party the night away, drink too much and spend the next day sleeping and recovering or simply going through the motions of doing whatever our families were doing whilst trying to cope with a hang-over.
Now as a much older man and having returned to church, I finally grasp the TRUE meaning of Christmas. It is a celebration of the Incarnation of the Word. What matters most is that the Christ child was born in a stable (or maybe some dirty hovel) in the poorest of conditions one night 2000 years ago. And that birth changed the world.
My family and I still maintain an annual tradition of gathering with friends and having sumptuous feasts of delicious food and sweet things.. but we do so in a spirit of fellowship, of enjoying one another’s company but more importantly, of remembering and celebrating a world-changing event.
We also continue the tradition of gifting but instead of buying gifts for one another, we set aside the money that we would have spent doing so and in recent years, now use that for the Angel Tree project in church so that food hampers and gifts can be bought for the less fortunate around us.
That is the real point of our celebration.
- adrian t
