Bah humbug Christians

I have a confession to make. I like the John Lewis Christmas advert. I know it's a sales vehicle but it's cute, sweet, brings a tear to your eye, features a boy, his toy and his Mum and Dad, has a happy ending and has resisted the inevitable push to be politically correct and have homosexual couples or a single parent family. What's not to like? What I don't like is the way that Christians are falling over themselves to remake it. I've seen two 'christian' versions of the ad and I don't like either of them. The first is by Central Church, Edinburgh entitled "Don't get your hopes up" - well that's a turn off for starters. The video lives down to the title. In fact, Central's Christmas theme is don't get your hopes up. Someone really ought to have a word with their marketing guys. Talk about negative! I just don't feel like going to one of their services to find out what I shouldn't get my hopes up about!

The second remake is by St Thomas Norwich and features a tiger instead of a penguin. Shades of Calvin and Hobbes .... except that Hobbes gets discarded .... *sniff* (gets hanky out but not for the reason the video makers intended) ...

I think what some Christians are forgetting, in their rush to point out the inevitable disappointment of Christmas when kids don't get half of their wish list (because John Lewis has run out of penguins) and the turkey is underdone and we fall out with the in-laws over the sherry trifle, is that it's just an ad. Adults enjoy it while knowing that it's trying to sell us something and kids need to learn to do the same. And it's OK for a kid to have a cuddly toy as their best friend. Of course Jesus is the ultimate best friend who will never leave or forsake us and it's the job of parents to teach this to their children along with the real meaning of Christmas but ... give me a break! And give me some hope! There's enough sadness and disappointment in the world without adding to it with penguins who don't hit it off and tigers who get dropped and forgotten.

Merry Christmas!

Only half the story

It was good to hear the Queen giving an unashamedly Christian Christmas message yesterday which emphasised the importance of family and community and, dare I say it, marriage between a man and a woman. It was better than many of her recent Christmas messages, so much so that it seems a shame to take issue with it, however...

I do have a problem with her saying that 'we sometimes need saving from ourselves' because I think we need saving from ourselves all the time. I also think that while forgiveness is at the heart of the Christian faith, as the Queen said, the message of forgiveness in Christ came after John the Baptist's call to repentance. One of the problems in our society today is the emphasis on love, reconciliation and rehabilitation without the requisite repentance and confession of wrong-doing. Indeed, how often do we hear on the news that some politician or other public person has 'denied any wrong-doing'. It has almost become a mantra. Our prisons are full of repeat offenders who have manifestly not repented of their crimes because society has more sympathy for them than for their victims.

Until our society heeds the call of John the Baptist it will not know the peace that comes through Christ.

'The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord' - Isaiah 40:3 (KJV)

Merry Christmas!

Wishing all my readers a very merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year.
Unashamed Arminian