In the 1600s, candles were used to light up Christmas trees and placed in windowsills to indicate where people could come worship. Not surprisingly, candles on Christmas trees caused many fires. Enter Thomas Edison’s brilliant light bulb invention that now allows us to safely decorate our trees and homes.
Putting up lights at Christmas is expected. In America, approximately 150 million sets of light are sold each year. Regardless of your belief in Jesus, NOT putting up some sort of lights at Christmastime will likely dub you a Scrooge. Christmas lights are great, and if you do an especially fantastic job, we will probably drive by your house—lights certainly can bring some happiness to the world.
Every year, our favorite tradition is to visit the James Island Festival of Lights with our ENTIRE family. Our caravan ranges between 30 and 40 people. We have it figured out. We arrive at dusk to avoid traffic, pick up pizzas for dinner, bring everything we need for DIY s’mores to enjoy around the firepit and use the app to “get in line” for a photo with Santa. My favorite display is always the dancing lights perfectly synchronized to music. The lights are perfect. But something always interrupts our “perfect” experience, whether it’s a puking child, hurt feelings, or a burn from the hot marshmallows. I’ve recently realized our expectations are too high for making events like this perfect, but aren’t nearly high enough for anticipating the true light of the world—our perfect savior.
John 1:10 tells us the world didn’t recognize Jesus when he came. He wasn’t what they were expecting. But, as actual followers of Christ, how are we living differently from the world? This Christmas season, I want to encourage you to ask the Lord what you can do to bring the actual light of Jesus to a dark and hurting world. What is something tangible you can do to raise their expectations about Jesus?
Here are a few ideas to get you thinking:
