thoughts on christmas

I have been wrestling with the American celebration of Christmas this year. As I hear statistics about how much the American public spends during the Christmas season my stomach becomes a bit queasy. I don't understand how one culture can consume so much. Do we celebrate Christ's birth with idolatry? Or do we simply just celebrate our idolatry without Christ in the equation? This may be beating a dead horse, but I feel that it needs to be said. I searched Google and Ask.com for some stats about how much we spend per Christmas season, I was shocked to see the results. Over 72 million shopped the internet on Cyber Monday, the traditional kickoff to the online shopping season after Black Friday, spending billions. Consumers spent a record breaking $154 billion dollars last year during the month of December according to forbes.com. To put that into perspective a billion seconds is 13 years. A billion dollars is a lot of money, that averages out to about $796 per person in the United States. Obviously some spend five times that amount and some spend five times less. Nonetheless, that is ridiculous. When did Christmas become about giving gifts? I think a trip back to Scripture and the Christmas story is needed.
In Matthew 2 we see the story of the Wise Men. They came from the east bearing gifts to Christ. This is where our tradition of giving gifts come from. However, the meaning of the gifts of the Wise Men have been lost. They didn't give Christ gifts because that is what he wanted or needed, they were all prophetic in nature. First he was given gold. This was a gift that was reserved only for royalty. The Wise Men were under the impression that Christ was an earthly king. In the East, tradition states that a new star will rise over the birthplace of a new king when he is born. Little did they know that Christ was no earthly king but the King of Heaven. However, their gift of gold still foreshadowed Christ's claims of being Lord and King over all. The second gift was frakincense. A bit of research will show that frakincense was in incense that smelled wonderful. In the Jewish culture, and really most cultures of antiquity, incense was offered to deities. The Jews would offer it to Yahweh. Other cultures would burn incense for their many Gods. The Wise Men offered Christ a gift that was reserved strictly for a deity. This foreshadowed passages such as John 1:1-18 where Jesus is proclaimed to be God incarnate. The third gift was myhrr. Myhrr was a perfume used during the embalming process. This is my favorite gift. This one foreshadows Christ's ultimate sacrifice for us on the Cross. What a powerful message through gifts. The last two gifts are more difficult to explain than the first one. As stated above, the Wise Men were under the impression they were visiting an earthly king, so the gold is easily explainable. However, it is a bit more difficult to explain why they brought the last two. I firmly believe that God the Father used them as prophets to herald the birth of his Son on the earth.
So why do give so much, with so little meaning? Is that new cell phone truly going to mean that much to us or is it just an idol? (Idols are simply a desire that we close in our hand and refuse to let God have control of, or something that we think will fulfill our desires and wants for pleasure or satisfaction better than God can) So the big question is this: Do I desire stuff or Christ more this season? If I desire Christ more, how can I show it?
I spoke of money above. I understand that the gifts that the Wise Men gave Christ were expensive, but they were rich with meaning as well. Are our gifts meaningful or just expensive?
I say these things because these are struggles I must fight as well. It's hard to not want that new cell phone, car, or (fill in the blank). Yearn for Christ this holiday season. He is what this season is truly all about.