Was Jesus Really Born on December 25?

I was recently asked this question: "I have always believed that December 25 was Jesus’ birthday. But a person recently told me that it was originally a pagan holiday. And that when Christians celebrate Jesus’ birthday on December 25, they are actually participating in a pagan ritual.  How should I respond to this person? Should we be celebrating Jesus’ birthday on December 25?"

The exact date of Jesus' birth, no one can say for sure, because the Bible does not tell us.  For the first 200 years, the early church did not celebrate Jesus' birth.  But they did celebrate the resurrection because Jesus’ death and resurrection is the most important part of the Gospel.  That is also the main focus in our church.  The Bible does say that Jesus came out of the tomb the first day of the week after the Sabbath (Matthew 28:1).  That is Sunday.  That is why we worship on Sunday and that is why we celebrate Easter on Sunday.  There is a debate as to when Jesus died.  Traditionally it has been said that he died on Friday.  That is why we call it Good Friday.  But if there was a special Sabbath that year, Jesus could have died on Thursday.  This is typically what I believe.  This would give you the three days that Jesus was in the tomb. Does the actual day Jesus died really matter that much?  No, because it was not the main emphasis of the Gospel story.  The main point is that he died for our sins.  The day that Jesus was raised from the dead apparently was very important for us to understand because all the Gospels tell us that it happened on Sunday or the first day of the week.

As for the day Jesus was born, we celebrate it on December 25, but no one knows for sure.  That is a day that the early church decided to celebrate Jesus’ birth.  Was that day chosen because it was the day that the pagans used to celebrate the birth of the sun god?  Possibly.  But does this mean that if we celebrate Jesus’ birth on that day, we are actually celebrating the sun god? Of course not.  The Scriptures do not specifically tell us when Jesus was actually born, so the day was chosen by the early church.  When we teach on the birth of Jesus Christ, never is my focus on the actual day December 25.  That is not the focus of Scripture.  We focus on the Scriptures and the story itself and not the day.

Let’s take Thanksgiving as an example. We celebrate Thanksgiving, but does the Bible tell us a day to celebrate Thanksgiving?  No.  Is it wrong to celebrate a day of thanksgiving to God for all his blessings on the fourth Thursday of November? Of course not.  It's just a day that helps us remember to focus on something very important.  It is the same way with Christmas.  The day itself is meaningless, but celebrating and worshiping God for what he did for us is important.  If it was not important for us to focus on Christ coming to earth, then it would not have been recorded for us in Matthew or Luke.

Let me explain how the early Catholic Church came up with their religious holidays.  They would come into a pagan area where people worship many gods.  The missionaries would tell them about Jesus.  These people would then turn from their pagan idols and turned to Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  Those missionaries would then look at their culture and their celebrations.  They would then tell them that they should no longer worship these pagan gods, but instead focus on the true God.  One group of Greeks used to worship the sun god on December 25.  So, they turned away from the sun god and repented of that pagan lifestyle.  The missionary said, in place of the sun god we will celebrate the birth of Jesus instead. So they worshipped Jesus instead of the sun god.

Another missionary went into Germany.  Here they would worship trees.  That missionary cut down their pagan tree that they worshipped.  He told them that rather than worshiping a pagan tree, we are going to worship Christ and his eternal life.  And to illustrate Jesus’ eternal life, we will place candles on an evergreen tree, representing the eternal life of Jesus Christ.  Eventually that led to the Christmas trees that we have today.  So, were celebrating the birth of Jesus on December 25 and having a Christmas tree pagan rituals?  Absolutely not.  They represented just the opposite. This was their way of repenting and turning away from the pagan ritual.  These holidays started as a sign of a new beginning of their new life in Christ.

The missionaries were not always successful at totally transforming a day into a Christian day.  Halloween has always been a pagan holiday.  The church tried to turn it into All Saints Day, when we remember the departed saints.  But that did not work.  The pagan tradition of Halloween continues to this day.  But we as a church continue trying to transform this holiday.  We do not celebrate Halloween, but we do have a fall festival and dress up and give away candy.  People could say that it is a pagan holiday that we are celebrating.  But we say that we are just taking a holiday of our culture and trying to use it for the glory of God to reach people in our neighborhood for Christ.  Do you see the difference?

I know that some people are so legalistic that they never see the good that has been done by converting a pagan day to a holy day.  But what I have observed is that these people are often full of pride and arrogance.  They portray themselves as the true spiritual Christians and everyone else is more carnal than they are.   All they can think about is that it had some kind of pagan roots, and therefore, it is all bad.  Paul speaks about folks like these in Colossians 2:16, “Let no one act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day.”  Don’t let these people judge you on something that you do out of sincerity and true worship of Christ.  I am glad that for one month our entire culture focuses on the birth of Christ.  I don't like the materialism of our culture, but at least there is some good that comes out of this day and celebration of Christmas.

Let me give you another illustration.  Many of the old hymns that the church has sung in worship were originally bar tunes that people play at bars.  People came to Christ and then changed the lyrics of those songs to transform them into worship songs.  Because people already knew the tune, they could now sing the song with the new lyrics about Christ.  A legalistic person might hear of this and say, this song is a pagan song.  Yet most people today sing these old hymns and have no idea that they were once bar tunes. Today, they are used by God in deep worship.  So are they pagan songs or worship songs?  I believe that since the meaning and lyrics of the songs have been changed, they are no longer pagan.  They are now worship songs used to lift up Christ in worship.  That is how I look at December 25.  Is it the actual day of Jesus’ birth?  I doubt it.  The Bible does not specifically say the actual day of Jesus’ birth.  But if this day can be converted and removed as a day that was set aside to worship a pagan god and can now be redeemed as a day of celebrating the coming of our Lord to save us, then I don't have a problem at all celebrating Jesus’ birth on December 25.  The day is no longer a pagan day.  It is a day that has been redeemed by the gospel of Jesus Christ.  I wish to God that we could redeem every day of the year in the same way.     

Pastor Tony