Black Friday

 

Psalm 138:1-6 “I will praise You with my whole heart; before the gods [specifically used in the plural thus, of the supreme God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit]. I will sing praises to You. I will worship toward Your holy temple, and praise Your name for Your lovingkindness and Your truth; for You have magnified Your word above all Your name. In the day when I cried out, You answered me, and made me bold with strength in my soul. All the kings of the earth shall praise You, O Lord, when they hear the words of Your mouth. Yes, they shall sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord. Though the Lord is on high, yet He regards the lowly; but the proud He knows from afar.” 

 

Before Halloween this year, I started seeing Christmas advertisements on the television commercials and in store displays. By November 1, the candy was swapped out and the preparation for “Black Friday” [the big sale on Christmas gift items on the day after Thanksgiving] was in full swing. I read that Black Friday has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year in the United States since at least 2005 and I can attest that it is a madhouse as many stores offer highly promoted sales on that day and open very early (it’s getting earlier all the time). It is said that the term “Black Friday” comes from the notion that retail stores that operate the entire year up to this event finds their bottom-line profits suddenly go into the black in their accounting ledgers due to this “spending spree”. I used to get up early, join the mayhem and wait in those massive lines, but not anymore; it’s madness. It is pure “shop until you drop” or max-out your credit card, whichever comes first. Now, Cyber-Monday has joined the mega-sales parade for online Christmas shopping.

 

But Christmas is not a commercial holiday and [as nice and enjoyable as it is] isn’t about our gift-giving; it’s about God’s gift to the world - Jesus - the Christ, God incarnate, God among us. We’ll discuss this more next month, but I have a question: What about the National holiday of Thanksgiving Day? It has virtually disappeared from the stores, except for a sale on frozen turkeys for the family get-together for dinner. I am not knocking the families getting together [we need more of that family love today], and I am not knocking the dinner feast of tasty old family recipes that only appear once a year to enjoy. I’m talking about our holy Creator God, who designed, created and provided the people and the food in the first place and the family of God.

 

We can get all caught up in this earthly existence, the shiny things that catch our eyes and the exciting distraction of the busyness, that we forget to be thankful for the provision of our lives and living, His lovingkindness and His truth. Life is glorious because of the glory of God in it. Thanksgiving is about giving thanks with our whole heart and praise from our soul to the author and sustainer of life. Our forefathers proclaimed a day set aside to thank the good Lord for His many blessings upon us. Let us not bypass that holiday of grateful praise and adoration of God, nor set our hearts on things of this earth, but foundational set our minds on things above and build on the foundation that is the Rock - the Lord on high; for in Him, all our days are in the black and profitable. 

 

In Christ, Brian