Christmas, "Our" holiday

Years ago, we were generally afraid of introducing western holidays to Thai Christians, fearing they would transfer their meaning (special days for Buddhism, or such) to Christmas. Plus we do a lot of stuff at Christmas that has nothing to do with our Lord's birth in America. While we still celebrated with our family behind closed doors, we would forgo all the merry trimmings and things.

But in recent years, it seemed to us and our fellow Christians that the world has lots of holidays, days off school, bank holidays and we have almost nothing. That is when we decided to make our Christmas celebration a little bigger and have more activities. You should see the excitement as we prepare songs from our annual Christmas parties and present exchange. Plus we have seen lots of people wanting to know about the Saviour's birth that we celebrate.

So we now make Christmas a real holiday, "Our" Christian's own holiday to preach the word, to remember the time that our Lord, became "Emmanuel" of God with man. It is also a busy time as other holidays we enjoy together, with special singing, fellowship, carolling, eating and Bible study.

May we wish all of you a very Merry Christmas from people who celebrate "our" holiday.