being christian means that you are a follower of christ..i am one....but so many christians today dont follow christ! instead they make up excuses of why they dont. for instance Christmas. so many christians celebrate it, and for what? Jesus didnt celebrate christmas nor did he celebrate his birthday, why? because birthdays were only celebrated by enemy's of god..like pharoah. but today many christians celebrate both birthdays and christmas! please explain such hypocrisy.
2007-04-03 12:10:48 · 45 answers · asked by star 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Also include Valentine, Halloween, Easter, Mass, New Year, Wedding etc., in hypocrisy list.
2007-04-03 12:20:39 · answer #1 · answered by RexRomanus 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Star, I think you are over reacting just a bit.
Jesus didn't celebrate His birthday because He didn't want to do anything that took a bit of glory away from His Father in heaven. Everything He did while on the earth was in total obedience to the Father. Scripture says that He came the first time humbly, as a servant. The next time it will be in glory as a victor. We will certainly be celebrating then.
I really don't know how celebrating birthdays got started but if you love some one and appreciate their place in your life, I don't think showing it by celebrating their birthday is hypocritical.
...especially considering what Jesus did for us. It may not be on the right day, that probably being closer to Eastertime, but it beats the heck out of the pagan holiday it took the place of. In fact it had become such a tool to express our appreciation of His incarnation, humbling Himself to meet us at our level to show us a new way of life with Him, that the enemy has gotten so involved in a commercial way that the meaning is getting really fouled up in the media. What we really need to do is start rejecting the media hype, stop going into debt each year, get back to basics and celebrate in a way that might please Him; an individual and more personal way, gathered with those loved ones available.
2007-04-03 12:59:42 · answer #2 · answered by jb 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Jesus may not have celebrated His own birthday and it probably wasn't on Dec. 25th. anyway BUT I don't think it is wrong to sing songs telling about His birth and give each other gifts remembering the greatest gift of all which was Jesus himself. In our church, we take up a special love offering for missionaries at Christmas time and we do other things for those with special needs. I do think that Christmas has gotten too secular with snowmen, Santa Claus and "Happy Holidays" being substituted for "Merry Christmas". I think it has been good in the long run because it has given us a chance to stand up for what we believe and share something spiritual with people. People need to do what the Holy Spirit leads them to do. If you don't feel right about celebrating Christmas and birthdays then by all means, you shouldn't. When I am convicted that it is wrong for me to do these things, I will stop as well. It is similar to the meat being offered to idols lesson in the New Testament. Some people have a more tender conscience about things. I don't feel that I'm being hypocritical because I don't feel that the Christmas and birthday celebrating is wrong.
2007-04-03 12:30:55 · answer #3 · answered by garden lady 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
not all Christians celebrate Christmas, I am a Christian and I do not celebrate Christmas as if it is Jesus's birthday because it is not, In the Bible it does not say exactly when Jesus was born but because of the discription of the climate of the location and the location it is more sensible to assume Jesus was born in September or October. I do celebrate on Christmas day St. Nickolas who was orphaned as a small child and upon adulthood was given a large amount of money from his parents estate. He then used this money to bring gifts to many orphaned children. He actually died on December 25th in Germany and that is where the holiday started. Id also like to add that we do not have a Christmas tree either. This is actually a pagan tradition that was accepted by the English church when they where trying to convert Pagans to Christians.
2007-04-03 12:58:05 · answer #4 · answered by jahvar's mama 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Honey, you already asked about Christmas and people responded. But since you insist...
Why does anyone celebrate anything? We celebrate stuff to remember it. Jesus didn't celebrate Easter; nor did any of his disciples. In fact, if you recally, they didn't believe him at first. They had more to celebrate on Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came down to them or even when Jesus appeared in their midst. Does that mean that Christians shouldn't celebrate Easter? After all, we should be rejoicing in the risen Christ daily, right? Why bother with a specific day - it changes every year anyway and we can mostly GUESS at what the real date was.
The point of all this is that we human beings need to remember things and we need to celebrate them. In our organized lil brains, we tend to do things on a equidistant, recurring basis, in this case, annually. So what if we celebrate Christmas? Who are we hurting?
2007-04-03 12:27:58 · answer #5 · answered by Church Music Girl 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Jesus wasn't a Christian either, he was a Jew.
Its a shame that so many just use the word "Christian" as a label for themselves without actually believing the things it entails.
Christmas: Its the coming of Christ. Why NOT celebrate the coming of the Messiah? Why not praise the Almighty for giving us the most perfect gift?
Easter: Jesus rose from the dead. He defeated sin and opened heaven for us. The perfect sacrifice is complete! We should celebrate and give thanks to Jesus for what He accomplished!
Birthdays: Are a party and a time for fun and rejoicing that God gave you another year. It helps to build fellowship with friends and families.
2007-04-03 12:18:27 · answer #6 · answered by lawlzlawlzduck 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
If u were a christian then u should for one know that Jesus birthday wasn't on christmas. We use that time to celebrate the coming of our Lord with merry-making and joy. I see nothing wrong for having a special time set aside to thank Him for coming.
Birthdays? Do u have anything else dumb u would like to argue about? Where does the Bible say it was wrong to celebrate birthdays? I think u need to spend more time actually studying what u wish to argue about.
2007-04-03 12:16:16 · answer #7 · answered by Chris 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Star, we don't know whether Jesus celebrated his birthday or not. The New Testament and the early church are completely silent on this subject. Unless the Bible explicitly forbids celebrating birthdays, what reason is there to think there's anything wrong with it? Now the fact that Pharaoh and Herod Antipas celebrate birthdays is no reasons to suspect it's wrong. It sounds like you're committing the fallacy of guilt by association.
2007-04-03 12:18:01 · answer #8 · answered by Jonathan 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
How do you know Christ did not celebrate his birthday? There is nothing in the Gospels that says he did or he didn't. He enjoyed a party and good wine, he probably went down to the pub with the boys for a drink on his birthday - and the birthdays of all the others.
2007-04-03 12:16:52 · answer #9 · answered by tentofield 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's true that we do not celebrate Christmas on the very day that Jesus was born and it is also true that Jesus did not celebrate his birthday. However, our culture has us celebrating things that are important to us. For Christians, Jesus' birth is very important and we want to celebrate it. I do not see how you would consider this hypocrisy.
You said: "because birthdays were only celebrated by enemy's of god..like Pharaoh." SO then are we considered God's enemies because we celebrate our birthdays and the birthdays of our friends?
2007-04-03 12:20:19 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
Dee, I like your logic, you are in the right tract! I am currently writing about: Where we were? Why are we here? Where are we going? These three questions always bothered me because, no one seemed to give me the right answer, because no one was really sure of the answer. Very briefly... Before you were born, you were non-existent; as you wisely described it, you were in nothingness. There were no invisible soul in Heaven waiting for the next available body for you to be born. That is why you do not have any recollection of anything before you were born. "I think; therefore, I am." When you were born, everything that you learned, all the way up to today, is what has become as you. You are you very thoughts. Imagine, if we did not have thoughts, we would be in nothingness again, as far as we know; just a living biological machine capable of nothing. When you die, you are in nothingness again, but there is only one difference, God has all your thoughts recorded; the very essence that makes you. God is willing to resurrect anyone loyal to Him and restore all their thoughts on an everlasting body, incapable of perishing and more powerful than the one we currently have. This is going to happen after the war of Armageddon; the war that marks Christ's return.
2016-05-14 16:52:02 · answer #11 · answered by raylene 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋