Little Rocks

Matthew 7:26-27, “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

Too often we are building our Christmas “house” on “little rocks” – little stones – on sand!

Most of us have multiple aspects to our Christmas “house” such as:

Christmas foods – fudge, peanut brittle, divinity, ribbon candy, sugar cookies, and date cookies

Christmas gatherings – family, friends, office parties, Christmas eve, special communions and Christmas programs and plays

Christmas music – carols, holiday music, cantatas, caroling, and concerts

Christmas lights – trees, outdoor displays, drive-thru light displays, and candles

Christmas gifts – toys, jewelry, cars, clothes, electronics, trips, or a lump of coal

Outside of manipulation or ill intent, these are all good things.  We build our Christmas time celebration – our “house” – on a host of these “little rocks” and what is often the result?

We pour in thought, money, and effort only to find our Christmas unfulfilling or even frustrating.  We plan, prepare and labor to make Christmas successful only to feel it fell short of hopes.  We pray and pray asking for love, joy, and peace yet do not find them happening.  We seek peace, calm, and goodwill and experience commotion and chaos.  We ponder, shop, and give seeking to richly bless another and find them indifferent or more enthralled with a sporting event, new movie, or the gift from another.  In short – our “house” falls down!

Why?  We have built on “little rocks”!  The “little rocks” don’t support the house in the rush and press of the season.

The problem is we are building Christmas on “little rocks” rather than building on the Rock.  Matthew 7:24, “…a wise man who built his house on the rock.”  The rock is Jesus!  I Corinthians 10:4

The lesson is that we need to clearly and boldly build our Christmas on Jesus!  The lesson is that when “little rocks” rise up to compete with or replace the Rock, the house will fall!

Jesus said – Matthew 10:37, He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me.  Mom and Dad are really, really important and to be highly esteemed (Exodus 20:12) ,BUT they are to never compete with Jesus or to supplant Jesus.  It is Jesus by a vast distance!  The same with Christmas – all the little things, while generally good and most often not sin, are a very distant – very distant – second to Jesus, the Rock!

The danger is that “little rocks” can become gods.  The family time or the Christmas Eve Communion service or the family tradition can become so important as to become a god – idolatry.  And God has declared, “You shall have no other gods before Me,” Exodus 20:3.

Each little rock has an importance and place but nothing remotely important compared to Jesus.  Christmas is about Jesus!  As the angels shouted, “Glory to the newborn King!” (from Hark! The Herald Angels Sing by Charles Wesley)

The “little rocks” of Christmas are not wrong, just wrong when they compete with Jesus.  May your Christmas be greatly about Jesus with all the other things being just “little rocks.”

[I just finished writing this and my father, sitting on a couch in the room with me, asked if we at church do any Christmas caroling.  He then lamented that we no longer talk about Jesus at Christmas (he did not know what I was writing).  He went on to note that we are no longer amazed, intrigued, nor taken by Christmas – we are no longer all about Jesus at Christmas!  I agree.]