Christmas Like a Child

The Christian band Third Day has a song on their Christmas album called “Christmas Like A Child.” I’d like to share some of the lyrics here; as you read, think about if perhaps you can relate to this sentiment. 

“I want to feel Christmas, how it used to be

With all of its wonder falling on me

This season has felt so empty, oh for quite a while

I want to feel Christmas like a child”

Have you lost the wonder of Christmas? Do the days of excitement and longing for December the 25^th feel like a distant memory? 

If so, this is natural. As we grow older, the eager anticipation for Christmas day fades. When I was a child, Christmas Eve was the longest day of the calendar year. It felt like a  long, lazy, uneventful string of nothings that existed purely to delay the imminent receiving of gifts. As an adult, however, I still look forward to Christmas (it truly is the most wonderful time of the year), but I’ve found that I am now okay with waiting on its arrival. 

Maybe you long for this childlike wonder and dabble in nostalgia because life is harder now that you are not a child. The childlike naivete you once had has been replaced by the harsh, cold realities of the “real world.” Where unbounded joy once reigned, worry and anxiety now sit on the throne. When the world once felt full of endless possibilities, you now feel stuck at the end of the road with no path forward. Before, you had not made that mistake, or that decision. Now, you live with a sense of regret and guilt that threatens to never leave you. 

There could be any number of reasons why Christmas doesn’t have the same spark it did when you were young. However, I would like to invite you to experience Christmas like a child once more. 

When Jesus was on earth, He had a lot to say about children. In Matthew 18, He said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (v. 3). What does it mean to become like children? The answer is found in the next verse: “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (v. 4). To become like a child, we must humble ourselves before our God. 

This may not be what you expected to hear. To be fully transparent, this is not the direction I thought this devotional would go in when I began writing. But that is one of the many wonderful qualities of God’s Word—it convicts and challenges us in ways we do not expect and couldn’t think of on our own. 

This truth makes sense, however. Children are humble by nature. They are in a position of dependence on adults to take care of them, teach them, and even feed them. Just as children are in a position of humility, we must live our lives in a posture of humility as children of our Heavenly Father. 

So, if we are to become like children (or experience Christmas like a child), we must humble ourselves before Christ. We must bow ourselves before Jesus, laying down our sin and our very selves. We must give up our pursuits, our desires, and the false securities we cling to. We let go of the ideas we have invented about God and cling to the truth of who He is. We give up the identity we have formed for ourselves and fully recognize the position as a son or daughter of the King. 

Are you in need of some child-like wonder this Christmas season? The secret—which isn’t actually so secret—is to humble yourself. “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you” (1 Peter 5:6). Turn and become like a child; humble yourself in this way. When you do, you will realize that: 

“It’s all about Jesus, asleep in the straw

This infant, this King, this Savior for all

So I don’t need bells to be ringing

‘Cause I’ll join with angels singing, ‘Gloria’

And I can feel Christmas like a child” 

(“Christmas Like a Child,” Third Day)