I dont have to celebrate Christmas!! yeehooey!

[Mary_Magdalene]

:clap:

My DH said we are not going to decorate, etc. on Christmas this year. He wants to do all the kids gifts on "easter" (one step at a time is good).

I have been praying about not celebrating this for years and he has agreed not to! We are going to give the kids gifts on easter still but at least i am out of one holiday. maybe next year he will agree to scrap easter.

gotta keep prayin'... :prayer:

[Tishri1]

:clap:

My DH said we are not going to decorate, etc. on Christmas this year. He wants to do all the kids gifts on "easter" (one step at a time is good).

I have been praying about not celebrating this for years and he has agreed not to! We are going to give the kids gifts on easter still but at least i am out of one holiday. maybe next year he will agree to scrap easter.

gotta keep prayin'... :prayer:Awesome news! This is truely exciting news! We do have to keep praying and not give up or loose hope!:clap:I remember the last Christmas we celebrated when my kids were tiny still, we have survived without it for 8 years now and enjoy the Hebraic Festivals just as well...My only regret is that more friends and family haven't joined us ...:clap:YET hehehe

[plum]

My family is still making normal Christmas plans as usual... So I will have to do some praying about what the best decisions and moves might be on my part. I don't want to blindly follow any crowd either way... but it's hard to stand on your own.

[Wags]

Well if he was really set on giving them gifts - the first night of Chanukah starts at sundown Dec 25th this year.

Baruch HaShem that progress is being made!

[Vaneeza Malkah]

presents tend to be year-round things for kids anyway, ending up with alot of toys that they never play with. I like how in our culture kids never get toys rather clothes or money.

[yod]

I'll ah have ah ah blewwww, blewwww christmas ah ah without yewwwwww.....

[Wags]

I'll ah have ah ah blewwww, blewwww christmas ah ah without yewwwwww.....

Elvis has left the building...:D

[Tishri1]

:wave:I'll ah have ah ah blewwww, blewwww christmas ah ah without yewwwwww.....Is that Yod with a tissue blowing his nose? I heard you were under the weather bro :sigh:... I've been praying for you and your family:wave:

[Tishri1]

look what I found kids...

http://paganwiccan.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?once=true&site=http://www.msu.edu/user/rohdemar/earth/sabbats/yule.html

what's this about we stole their holiday....:eek:

[yod]

Wow...that is fabulous.

Can't wait to show my wife.


Do you mind if I post that link and article all over the internet?

[Vaneeza Malkah]

you know as I was studying about pagan and christmas, and I read that "yule" means sun (g-d) and wheel it made me think of the "chakrah" in India because it means the exact same thing. Sun (g-d) and wheel.

[Tishri1]

Wow...that is fabulous.

Can't wait to show my wife.


Do you mind if I post that link and article all over the internet?

Be my guest :wave:

[plum]

Today my family was making Christmas plans (we always have celebrated as a family somehow) and it was interesting... I felt no emotional connection to the holiday at all. They even commented on how "bland" I sounded when I spoke of it... now, I don't mean any disrespect to my family... but it was interesting. This is the first year I've felt like this.

So it turns out my sister and I will be flying to CA to be with our brother and very pregnant sister-in-law for that week. I'm so happy to be seeing family, but concerned about how it will go. They belong to a super-Baptist church (the kind where you go three times a week at the very least, and such) which, in itself, is nothing bad at all. But I felt very, very uncomfortable the last time I was there with them. And now that it will be a holiday season, I have no doubt we will be carted along with them three or four times during the week.... and I just feel kind of strange about it all.
I don't think any worse of anyone who lovingly celebrates the Messiah's birth on that day. If it is in the heart and the passion of the soul to grow closer to the L-rd, how can I think of myself any higher than they? I am not at all.
But it makes me cringe some to think of going back to that church again... so many times... afraid to offend my brother and sis-in-law or something.

[yod]

I'm not against Christmas necessarily...but it makes no sense to me knowing that it is a fabrication from the beginning. Something about that worshipping in "spirit and in truth" thing that bugs me now that I know God has ordained festivals which can not be commercialized...and have rich & deep spiritual significance.

ESPECIALLY compared to what we know as holidays.


There is nothing particularly wrong with birthday celebrations but they are a later European cultural thing which God didn't seem to put much emphasis on. Why not celebrate what He has told us to celebrate instead....or at least also?

I honestly don't see anything wrong with giving a spiritually different meaning for any HoliDay since all days belong to Him. Yet that shouldn't be done to the detriment of even being aware of the HolyDays which He has given us.

We should honestly recognize that Christmas and Easter are not really being done for "Him" as much as for ourselves. WE want a tradition. WE want a holiday. WE want His birthday to be Dec 25th.

His Birthday is more than adequately celebrated on Succot (Festival of Tabernacles) and His death/resurrection are supremely better celebrated by the Passover festivals (unleavened bread, pesach, firstfruits).

Shavuot (Day of Pentecost) is being celebrated by JEWS all over the world as one their biggest HolyDays and the church barely mentions it. How weird is that? http://www.worthyboards.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/huh.gif

Who doesn't want a festival of rejoicing in the Lord?

rule #1 is that I don't ever want to beat anybody up over it either way. I only bring it up to show the questions I ask myself.

[Mary_Magdalene]

My DH and I discuss these things alot. He doesn't feel that gentiles should celebrate any of the feasts-that they are for Jews only.

My point to my husband was this- If there is a question whether we should celebrate man made holidays or G-d made celebrations, I would rather err on the side of celebrating something that is G-d made vs. something that is not from G-d.

[Tishri1]

I agree with both of you....Christmas has become "Gramma's" holiday in our family...no one else cares about it except her. Sad but true, so we go to gramma's and eat on Dec 25th and talk (she plays chistmas music in the background) Watch HBO movies or something rented, and if she has any presents we open them...It you take away the presents and music it really is just another get together at grammas (she doesn't have a tree or anything).

We give her a gift on Hannukah and she does come sometimes but hasn't really been into it YET(I think this year will be different).

I don't have to put her down(and I never would she's adorable) but she is still hurt that Christmas doesn't mean anything to us anymore...I should point out to her that if she came on Hannukah she would get 8 evenings togethers with us instead of just 1....hmmmm that sounds nice:)

[Vaneeza Malkah]

I don't have to put her down(and I never would she's adorable) but she is still hurt that Christmas doesn't mean anything to us anymore...I should point out to her that if she came on Hannukah she would get 8 evenings togethers with us instead of just 1....hmmmm that sounds nice:)

Good attitude Tishri! It's not easy when our husbands/loved ones don't agree, but I've been slowly learning to teach with silence :)

[plum]

I'm not against Christmas necessarily...but it makes no sense to me knowing that it is a fabrication from the beginning. Something about that worshipping in "spirit and in truth" thing that bugs me now that I know God has ordained festivals which can not be commercialized...and have rich & deep spiritual significance.

ESPECIALLY compared to what we know as holidays.


There is nothing particularly wrong with birthday celebrations but they are a later European cultural thing which God didn't seem to put much emphasis on. Why not celebrate what He has told us to celebrate instead....or at least also?

I honestly don't see anything wrong with giving a spiritually different meaning for any HoliDay since all days belong to Him. Yet that shouldn't be done to the detriment of even being aware of the HolyDays which He has given us.

We should honestly recognize that Christmas and Easter are not really being done for "Him" as much as for ourselves. WE want a tradition. WE want a holiday. WE want His birthday to be Dec 25th.

His Birthday is more than adequately celebrated on Succot (Festival of Tabernacles) and His death/resurrection are supremely better celebrated by the Passover festivals (unleavened bread, pesach, firstfruits).

Shavuot (Day of Pentecost) is being celebrated by JEWS all over the world as one their biggest HolyDays and the church barely mentions it. How weird is that? http://www.worthyboards.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/huh.gif

Who doesn't want a festival of rejoicing in the Lord?

rule #1 is that I don't ever want to beat anybody up over it either way. I only bring it up to show the questions I ask myself.
wonderful thoughts, yod :hug: you have a wonderful perspective on things. refreshing.

[Bananna]

congratulations,

Pray at the same time for real coviction and no vascilating.
bananna

[visionary]

I am so new at all these Godly feasts. I am living with my family who are into the wordly feasts. I am alone in my convictions and overwhelmed. Not looking forward to the "holidays".

[Tishri1]

I am so new at all these Godly feasts. I am living with my family who are into the wordly feasts. I am alone in my convictions and overwhelmed. Not looking forward to the "holidays". I never look forward to the Churches Holidays, I even get sad about them and then get a sigh of relief when they are over...wonder if God feels the same way:scratch:

I love Hanukkah though:wave:

[Mary_Magdalene]

Is Hanukkah a "biblical" holiday? Or a traditional holiday? I don't know much about all this, I just can't remember if I ever read anything in the Word about that specific holiday...

:)

[iitb]

Is Hanukkah a "biblical" holiday? Or a traditional holiday? I don't know much about all this, I just can't remember if I ever read anything in the Word about that specific holiday...

:)
Traditional.

[CovenantRay]

Traditional.

Shabat Shalom:

I humbly disagree, In the gospel of John, Chapter 10, verse 22 [HNV]:



(Joh 10:22) It was the Feast of Chanukkah at Yerushalayim.



The events remembered are in the "intertestimental" period, approximately 165 BCE (this is by my sometimes faulty memory).

The verse in John is often rendered "Feast of the Dedication" for the rededication of the temple after the desecration by the Asyrians.

Todah,

CovenantRay :prayer:

[iitb]

Actually, it just depends on how you define "traditional." In this case, I'm using it in the sense that the observance of Chanukkah isn't explicitly commanded in the Torah. Yeshua didn't view all tradition as bad, as can be seen in the scripture you quoted. ;)

[Mary_Magdalene]

Sorry, I was wondering if it is ever mentioned in G-d's Word or not...

[CovenantRay]

Sorry, I was wondering if it is ever mentioned in G-d's Word or not...

Shabat Shalom Godschosengirl:

The only time it is recorded in the scriptures that I know of is in that verse. The apocryphal books of the Maccabees are thought to be largely historically accurate, though not scripture. Did we answer the question?

CovenantRay :prayer:

PS No offence intended IITB, and I pray that none was taken.

[iitb]

PS No offence intended IITB, and I pray that none was taken.
None taken whatsoever. :)

[Bon]

Sorry, I was wondering if it is ever mentioned in G-d's Word or not...

John 10:22 Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. 23 And Jesus walked in the temple, in Solomon’s porch.

This is the only reference to Chanukkah (Feast of Dedication) in the Gospels.

Did Yahshua keep this 'traditional' feast?
I seems that way....as He went to the temple on that particular occasion.

Bon

[Vaneeza Malkah]

Just for curiousity sake, the haftorah portions read during the first and second shabbat of Channukah are Zechariah 2:14-4:7 aka 2:10-4:17 and 1 Kings 7:40-50, The BH/NT portion is John 10:22-39

[Mary_Magdalene]

Shabat Shalom Godschosengirl:

Did we answer the question?

Yes. Thanks to all! :wave:

[dignitized]

look what I found kids...

http://paganwiccan.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?once=true&site=http://www.msu.edu/user/rohdemar/earth/sabbats/yule.html

what's this about we stole their holiday....:eek::sigh: