Why It's OK to Have a Christmas Tree

At least three times in the last year, I have heard from Christians who are concerned that they shouldn't have a Christmas tree, or maybe shouldn't celebrate Christmas, because many Christmas customs are adopted from pagan customs. Some Christians worry that the date of Christmas was picked to replace pagan holidays such as Saturnalia (likely true), that the Christmas tree came from pagan rituals (uncertain, but possible), or that the star on the tree comes from star worship (not too likely, in my opinion).

To answer this concern, let me ask a very different question: is it OK for Christians to use the names for the days of the week and the months? The days of the week honor Norse gods: Sun day, Moon day, Tiw's day, Odin's day, Thor's day, Freya's day, Saturn day. Some of the months honor Greek and Roman gods (Janus, Mars, Aphrodite, Maia, Juno) while others honor deified Roman emperors (Julius, Augustus). But no one seems to have a problem with this, for a very good reason: when Christians say "Thursday," they are not worshipping Thor, and no one else thinks they are, either. The Bible prohibits idolatry, but idolatry consists of worshipping other gods. Worship is not something that one does unintentionally; it's a matter of the heart.

This is why it's OK to have a Christmas tree, give gifts, put a star on your tree, and celebrate Jesus' birth on December 25 (even if he wasn't born then). When I erect a Christmas tree, none of my neighbors thinks I am worshipping some old druid god, and I certainly have no intent to worship anything. In fact, to genuine pagans, my devout observance of Christmas in honor of Jesus is a testimony to my faith in Christ, not my worship of any other god.

Symbols and words are not permanently tainted merely because they are used by another religion ("I know and am convinced in the Lord that nothing is unclean in itself..." says Paul in Rom 14:14, referring to meat sacrificed to idols). Cults misuse baptism and the Lord's Supper, but that does not mean we should no longer baptize or share in communion. When Solomon built the first temple for God in the Old Testament, there had already been pagan temples for at least two thousand years. The design of Solomon's temple even had some similarities to Egyptian temples. The fact that temples were used by other religions did not make it wrong to build a temple to God or to use the temple as a metaphor for God's people. There are lots of other examples in the Bible of using (or redeeming) terms and symbols from the pagan world. Paul quotes the poem "A Hymn to Zeus" in Acts 17:28. While astrology and the worship of stars is condemned in the Bible, stars are repeatedly used as symbols of Jesus, Israel, and the church - so it is OK for you to put a star on your Christmas tree.

Finally, celebrating Christmas is allowable because the Scripture gives us personal freedom in such matters. In 1 Cor 8-10, Paul tells Christians not to participate in idol feasts, because idol feasts involved acts of worship to other gods, and everyone knew such feasts were designed to honor other gods. But in 1 Cor 10:25-33, Paul says that Christians can eat meat that was sold in an idol market, because it is not an act of worship, and the meat is not permanently tainted. Paul also says that Christians have freedom to celebrate religious holidays or not according to their own conscience, and even warns us not to condemn others for their decisions in these areas of freedom (Rom 14:1-14, Col 2:16-17). The Bible forbids worship of other gods - but celebrating Christmas by putting up a Christmas tree does not constitute worship, especially when we do it in honor of Jesus.

"Do not let what is for you a good thing be spoken of as evil, for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking [or celebrating Christmas or not!], but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit" (Rom 14:16-17). The Christian life is primarily about living out the virtues of Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit. If Christmas is a good thing for you that leads you to think about Jesus, then enjoy it - but more importantly, make sure that your Christian life is primarily about things that really matter, not minor quibbles about Christmas.

The picture: The Nativity, by an unknown Ottonian, ca. 1025-1050.

The Real Saint Nicholas (re-post)

It's hard being a professor's kid. When my kids ask me if Santa Claus is real, I answer, "Of course. Here's his picture." And I show them this picture of the actual St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra (AD 280-346), historical basis of the Santa Claus legend (take off the "ni" from his name and you can see how we got "Claus").

The photo is a reconstruction from Nicholas' skull, made by a forensic anthropologist. Nicholas was briefly disinterred in the 50s, and high-quality photographs of his remains were eventually used to create a 3-D image of his face. Nicholas was Greek, so his complexion is a little more olive than the rosiness of modern Santa Claus.

Nicholas had a broken nose, which may be related to accounts that he was imprisoned and tortured during Diocletian's persecution of Christians in AD 303. Like most other bishops of his time, he was present at the Nicene Council (AD 325).

There are all sorts of interesting stories about St. Nicholas: he gave dowries to poor girls to save them from prostitution; he appealed on behalf of unjustly condemned men; and my personal favorite: he slapped the heretic Arius in the face at the Nicene Council.

Of course, you should probably take all of this with at least a little grain of salt, since legends tend to accumulate around saints and their remains - but I think I like Nicholas of Myra better than the fat man at the North Pole!

As good old St. Nick would say, Kala Christougenna!

Evangelical Theological Society, Day 3

Final day of ETS! Here are the highlights:

• Found a good sushi place today - best I've had since leaving Hawaii. Funny - they had a health warning posted about eating raw fish.
• The best part of being at these conferences, as everyone agrees, is spending time with people. I have enjoyed having coffee or meals with former students, former professors, and colleagues who teach all over the country. Kind of strange - I am only (ha!) 42, but I think I have at least 7 or 8 former students who are now professors.
• NT Wright gave a really good lecture near the end of ETS yesterday, and Tom Schreiner and Frank Thielman responded to him. They covered lots of ground, but several things impressed me. 1) All three were models of Christian civility, even in their disagreements with each other - something sometimes lacking in this debate. They emphasized their points of agreement (e.g. substitutionary atonement, Christ as the heart of the gospel, and others), and did not overstate their areas of disagreement. Wright was rather pointed as he addressed the crowd, asking them not to quote him out of context or allow false rumors about him to spread (he has taken a lot of heat, some of it quite unfair, in books and especially blogs). 2) Wright agrees that Paul teaches that sin and guilt transfer to Jesus (substitutionary atonement) but he doesn't think that Paul teaches that righteousness transfers to the believer (imputation of righteousness). However, I was surprised to hear him admit that there might be space for imputation as a trajectory in Paul's thought stemming from union with Christ. 3) I found myself persuaded by Wright's reading of the larger narrative of salvation (you can read his work on this, but it emphasizes the roles of Adam, Abraham, Israel and Jesus in God's plan), but in general I am still unpersuaded by how he reads it into particular passages in Romans and Galatians. 4) Wright is sometimes viewed as overemphasizing the role of works in justification, but in the conversation between the three, it became apparent that this difference might be more semantic than real. All three (along with most Paul scholars) recognize that Paul repeatedly emphasizes that we will be judged for our works, but that our justification rests solely on faith in Christ and his work.
• Craig Keener discussed his new book on the historical Jesus. Lots of good stuff (about 800 pages), but in the presentation, he emphasized 1) Studies of ancient biographies show that biographers were relatively bound by their available data despite authorial purposes and biases. He showed how the three biographers Suetonius, Tacitus and Plutarch all had significant overlap in the details of their account of the Roman emperor Otho. Keener suggests this should affect our view of the biographies of Jesus (the gospels). 2) Studies of memorization prove that both ancient and modern cultures regularly preserve vast amount of information by memory alone, and that very little changes in the memorized material over generations. The first of the gospels was written within 40 years of the events, and relies on even earlier memorized material, demonstrating that there is no reason to believe that lots of extraneous material crept into the memorized data about Jesus.
• On Friday night, I went to the Institute for Biblical Research. This year, they started giving away the traditional free book to members only, so it looks like I finally need to apply for membership! NT Wright was again the speaker. I won't try to summarize his paper here; its content about Jesus' message of the kingdom might be revolutionary in many of our churches (which was his point), but is almost commonplace among evangelical gospels scholars. Still, Wright managed to present it in a compelling and even entertaining manner. Ditto for his respondent, Michael Bird. 
• Favorite quote/anecdote of the week: Tom Wright told about being stuck in traffic in London. The cabby saw his clerical collar (Wright was a bishop until recently) and said (imagine a good Cockney accent) "You anglican bishops are having quite a row over women bishops, aren't you?" Wright agreed. The cabby weighed in, "Well, the way I figure it, if God raised Jesus from the dead, then the rest is all rock'n'roll, i'n't it?" Wright said that quote became the main text of his next Easter sermon.

Evangelical Theological Society, Day 2

So here are the highlights of day two of the conference:

• I had grits for breakfast. Of course, this obligated me to quote Joe Pesci in My Cousin Vinny to my friends: "Sure I've heard of grits. I just never actually seen a grit" and "How could it take you five minutes to cook your grits when it takes the entire grit-eating world twenty minutes?"
• Celebrity Alert: I saw Darrel Bock going down the escalator. I have it on good authority that some of his friends call him "Dome of the Bock" because of his vast forehead. This, of course, in contrast to my own thick, wavy hair.
• Christian Book Industry Bailout Alert: I haven't bought any more books today, but it will be hard to avoid if I go back into the exhibit hall.
• Last night's plenary session (for some reason, half the people say plee-nary and half say plenary, but that's not important right now): Tom Schreiner gave a brilliant lecture responding to Wright's view of justification. It was incredibly well-organized, strongly argued, and very gracious. Schreiner's basic points: 1) Wright is a gifted scholar who has contributed immensely to NT scholarship, but his view on justification needs correcting. 2) Wright thinks justification is fundamentally about ecclesiology (the inclusion of Gentiles in the people of God), but Schreiner showed that the terms related to justification are constantly used in soteriological passages to communicate the granting of right moral standing. 3) Wright doesn't believe in imputation of righteousness, but Schreiner worked through several texts showing that Paul taught it. 4) Wright believes that "works of the Law" refers not to all Law-keeping, but to the use of certain laws (circumcision, diet, and holy days) as Jewish boundary markers. Schreiner showed numerous passages in Paul where this definition just cannot work. (I probably missed something there, but you can read Schreiner's paper in a few months). Looking forward to hearing Wright speak tomorrow.
• Danny Hays presented a paper this morning on how the story of the Ethiopian eunuch's conversion (Acts 8) alludes to the story of another Ethiopian eunuch in Jeremiah 38-39. I was interested in this story because of a project I am working on about allusions to the OT in Luke-Acts. I had noticed the reference to Jeremiah, but could not figure out what Luke was doing with it. Hays had a great explanation. Hays spent several years in Ethiopia, and has an interest in Africans in the Bible (he's also co-author of a great undergrad hermeneutics textbook).
• Nicholas Piotrowski presented a paper on an allusion to Ezekiel 36 in Matthew 1:21. Among other interesting claims, Piotrowski suggests that the Ezekiel allusion contributes to an "end of Exile" theme in Matthew; that is, some Israelites viewed themselves as still in the Exile, and Jesus ended that.
• You can see by my choice of lectures that one of my special interests is how the New Testament uses the Old Testament.

Evangelical Theological Society, Day 1

So here I am, at theological nerdvana again. This year, three or four thousand scholars from around the country have converged on Atlanta, and all of them were trying to get on the same elevator at dinner time. But besides that, I'm having a wonderful time. There were probably a hundred lectures today, but I made it to about five. Here are today's highlights:

• I helped keep the Christian academic book industry afloat by buying two books, The Heresy of Orthodoxy and Keep Your Greek. I bought the second book primarily because of the title of ch. 2: "Burn Your Interlinear: The interlinear is a tool of the devil, designed to make preachers stupid." Amen!
• Celebrity Alert: I met Bill Mounce while signing in at the hotel.
• Another Celebrity Alert: While I was glancing over Wayne Grudem's new book on politics and Christianity, Grudem walked by and said "Buy it! Buy it!" I bet he didn't know he would be quoted.
• I just listened to my friend Ken Berding present a very good paper arguing that the proper translation of Rom 8:27 should be "and [the Spirit] who searches hearts knows the [believer's] mind set on the Spirit, because he intercedes for the saints according to God's purposes" instead of the traditional translation: "and [God] who searches hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because he intercedes for the saints according to God's purposes."
• Darrel Bock, Gordon Johnston and Herb Bateman gave a presentation of their book, Jesus the Messiah. It covers how OT messianic texts were understood when they were first written, how they were understood by readers in Second Temple Judaism, and how they were understood by the authors of tne New Testament. Bock used the imagery of a puzzle: OT passages that contained limited information about the Messiah, or only hinted at the Messiah, are the separate puzzle pieces. Jesus put the pieces together in ways that were not anticipated by many before him.
• A student, Jonathan E. Parnell, gave a good presentation of how Piper and Wright differ in how they read the Bible, resulting in different views. Wright emphasizes (overemphasizes, according to the presenter) the Jewish conceptual framework, allowing it to be more significant than the text itself, while Piper uses background information, but allows the text to dominate. One respondent pointed out that Piper allows broader theological concepts to dominate over the text.

Not this... but that. (Ephesians 4-5)

This morning, I was paying attention to the string of contrasts in Ephesians 4 and 5. Each of them explains the first contrast, found in Eph 4:22-24: lay aside the old self... put on the new self.

not falsehood... but truth

don't steal... but work so you can be generous

don't use rotten words... but give gracious, edifying words

not bitterness, anger... but kindness, compassion, forgiveness

don't be unwise... but wise

don't be foolish, but understand the will of the Lord

don't get drunk, but be filled with the Spirit

For several of the contrasts, Paul explains a little more of what he means. For example, being "filled with the Spirit" in Eph 5:18 is explained in the rest of the sentence (found in vv. 19-21): "speaking to one another in psalms... giving thanks... submitting to one another..."

When Paul says "understand the will of the Lord" (Eph 5:17), it's easy to misunderstand him. Usually, Christians use that sort of language to refer to big decisions like what job to take, whom to marry, or what church to attend. But for Paul, "the will of the Lord" is the opposite of the items in the first column, and it is like the items in the second column. So "the will of the Lord" is not lying, stealing, rotten words, foolishness or getting drunk, and it includes truthfulness, generosity, gracious words, kindness, and wisdom.

What I like about this is that it makes "the will of the Lord" something that is within reach. The will of the Lord is not this... but that. God's will is not about which job or church I pick, but about rejecting my "former conduct" and putting on the new self (Eph 4:22-24). I can be certain that I am "in God's will" when I am being kind, forgiving, wise, thankful, and worshipful, regardless of whatever "big decisions" I may be struggling with.

The picture: a depiction of the book of Ephesians, from Biblia ectypa: Bildnussen auss Heiliger Schrift (an illustrated Bible) by Christoph Weigel, 1695. Image courtesy of the Digital Image Archive, Pitts Theology Library.

Erasmus on Interpretation

"For there are some secret places in the Holy Scriptures into which God has not wished us to penetrate more deeply and, if we try to do so, then the deeper we go, the darker and darker it becomes, by which means we are led to acknowledge the unsearchable majesty of divine wisdom, and the weakness of the human mind."

-Erasmus of Rotterdam, preface to On the Freedom of the Will, 1524.

Jesus in Context

"If you don’t put Jesus in his proper context, you will inevitably put him in a different one, where he, his message, and his achievement will be considerably distorted." Found in a nice article by N.T. Wright about C.S. Lewis (thanks to euangelion for pointing it out).

If you already like Wright, you will enjoy this article. If you are skeptical about some of Wright's ideas (as I am), you will see a bit of Wright's admirable heart and observe that he is quite a bit like Lewis.

Vacation Pictures

You can take a look at our family vacation pictures here and our day at Sequoia National Park here.

Jesus Was Not a Rebel

When I say that Jesus was not a rebel, I mean that he was not a rebel in the way that most modern or post-modern Americans define rebel. When I hear or read a claim that Jesus was a rebel, it usually implies the following definition:

A rebel opposes authority simply because it is authority. A rebel flaunts traditions simply because they are traditions.

People who view Jesus as this sort of rebel emphasize that he publicly broke Sabbath traditions and consorted with outsiders such as tax collectors and prostitutes. But does this sort of rebel image really fit Jesus? As I read the Gospels, it seems clear to me that Jesus was not opposed to all authority or all tradition. Rather, he sought to overthrow one sort of authority and replace it with another. Read the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5-7) carefully - Jesus rejects the authority of the scribes and Pharisees, but he replaces it with his own authority and the authority of the Torah. Jesus was not opposed to all traditions, but only to those traditions that prevented genuine obedience to the even older tradition of the Law.

Why does this matter? Because it seems to me that a certain class of Christian routinely skewers authority and traditions and uses the excuse that Jesus was a rebel. Before we begin to flaunt Christian traditions by swearing or smoking pot (for example), we need to ask if that sort of rebellion is really anything like what Jesus did. Jesus broke bad rules and replaced them with "greater righteousness" based on love for God and neighbor.