Advent Calendar VII

Advent is a time of preparation and contemplation, preparation for the time when we celebrate the birth of Christ, contemplation of the human condition that means we need Christ in our lives; what it is that we need a saviour to save us from, and the nature of the freedom that we are released into.   It is not simply a time for chocolates, shopping, and pictures of Betty on my Blog.

For me it is also a time for getting annoyed by Christmas songs that have nothing to do with Christmas and Christmas Carols that are Biblically unsound.    So here are a few of the essential things I would like people to understand.

• Christ was probably not born on the 25th December, that is the day on which we choose to celebrate His birth, and of course the calendar has changed several times since His birth.
• Even if Christ were born on the 25th December it is most improbable that it might have been snowing in Palestine!
• There is nothing to suggest that Christ did not cry! indeed one would have to worry how Mary would have known when he was hungry if He did not.
• There is nothing in the Bible that suggests that there were three kings! Wise men came from the east, bring gifts of Gold, Incense and Mir, this does not suggest that there three of them bringing one gift each, rather they are prophetically symbolic of Christ's live, death and resurrection.
• Holly, Ivy, and Christmas Trees are Germanic pre Christian symbols of rebirth following the winter solstice.

So I will not be singing "We three Kings" "Away in a Manger" "In the bleak mid winter"  I am so glad that there are so many really, really good new and traditional Christmas songs.