Should Christians celebrate Christmas and Easter?

The Church & Christian LifeIn theological review

The short answer

Yes, Christians are free to celebrate Christmas and Easter, and free not to; Scripture treats days of this kind as a matter of conscience. Paul says one person esteems one day above another and another esteems all days alike, and that each should be fully convinced in his own mind, honouring the Lord either way. What is not permitted is judging or despising a brother over it.

The fuller answer

Neither festival is commanded in Scripture, and honesty should start there. The New Testament records Jesus' birth and resurrection in detail, and commands the church to proclaim his death in the Supper until he comes, but it sets no annual calendar of feasts for Christians. Christmas and Easter grew in the churches over the early centuries as yearly seasons for teaching and celebrating those events. That history makes them traditions, good or bad as traditions go, rather than commands. Traditions may be kept gladly, reformed where they have grown distorted, or in conscience declined, but they may not be preached as law.

One person regards a certain day above the others, while someone else considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes a special day does so to the Lord; he who eats does so to the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God.

Romans 14:5-6 (BSB)

Paul's teaching on days cuts in both directions at once. To the Romans he writes that the one who observes a day, observes it in honour of the Lord, and warns both the observer and the non observer against passing judgement on each other, since God has welcomed both. To the Galatians he is sharper, troubled that converts were turning back to observing days and seasons as though their standing with God depended on it. The difference is not the calendar. It is whether a day is being kept as celebration or trusted in as righteousness. The first is freedom. The second is the gospel quietly replaced.

Therefore let no one judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a feast, a New Moon, or a Sabbath.

Colossians 2:16 (BSB)

Colossians tells the church to let no one pass judgement in questions of festivals and Sabbaths, calling such things shadows of the substance that belongs to Christ. Practically, then, celebrate Christmas and Easter as most Christians across the world and the centuries have done: as loud, grateful anniversaries of the incarnation and the resurrection, taught carefully to children, stripped of whatever in your household's version has crowded Christ out. And extend Paul's courtesy to the minority who in conscience keep neither. The events are the substance. The dates are the wrapping, and Christians may differ over wrapping without dividing over Christ.

You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! I fear for you, that my efforts for you may have been in vain.

Galatians 4:10-11 (BSB)

The Galatians passage shows why the conscience rule is not mere politeness. Paul watches former pagans, now believers, scrupulously observing days and months and seasons and years, and tells them he fears his labour over them was in vain, not because calendars are evil but because they were rebuilding, with religious materials, the very slavery Christ had freed them from. Any festival keeping, Christmas and Easter included, drifts the same way when it becomes anxious, meritorious or compulsory. Kept in the freedom Paul describes, the same observances become what the best of the church's tradition always intended: teaching, memory and joy.

Sources

Berean Standard Bible (BSB)

Review status: in-theological-review. Every Contend page passes a human theological review against the Statement of Faith before it is published as approved teaching. This section is in that queue.

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