Birthday Celebrations
Birthdays can be a great time to bring family and friends together, but they can also be a time to reflect or even a time of stress knowing you are one year older than you were last year. When I was first converting to the Christian life I had heard that celebrating birthdays were not necessarily Biblical and that they should not necessarily be celebrated. I will put this into its context in a bit, but the point is Birthdays tend to be a part of most people’s lives, regardless of whether it is a reminder to renew your driver’s license, or that you are being reminded that it is a family member or friend’s birthday coming up. So this week I will discuss birthday celebrations, using the Bible as the go to reference book of choice.
In general, there is no mention of birthday celebration by the righteous characters of the Bible. Neither is there any though shalt nots, about birthdays mentioned in the Bible. The point is that, although yes, we should get along with all and we need to find a balance in life in general (Romans 12:18). We are not to turn anything in life, including our birthdays or the birthdays of others into a situation that becomes idolatrous against God. We can and should enjoy a long life, because God gave it to us. Thank Him for the life He has given us, but do not turn celebrating it into some sort of self-indulged and self-aggrandized situation. Christ came for us, to save us from our sins; He came to give us life and life more abundantly (John 10:10)! If we are going to celebrate this life, let us celebrate it for the Glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31)!
Darrell
darrellmowat.wordpress.com 