Christmas is a special time of the year. Most get enough time off work to be able to spend more of it with family and friends. Many even get enough free time to go (over the river and through the woods) out of town to visit relatives in far away places.
When you’ve lived in the same place for as long as I have (and I know there are some that have lived in their place even longer), you begin to notice things about those that “come home for Christmas.” Generally, they fall into one of two categories. They come back out of respect and love for what they grew up in, or they return to “prove something.”
If you’ve served in a church that stands for anything for a certain period of time, you’ve seen the same thing also. Some return and it’s a joy to see them. They are happy to see what God has been doing in your church and it thrills you to hear how the Lord has been working in their life and family. Even though they are now somewhere else, and they may even practice their Christianity in slightly different ways, they still love and respect the place that God had for them while they were growing up. All this is visible. You can see it without even talking to them.
The others do not respect or love their old home. It’s visible. You can see it without even talking to them. In the little things that don’t send you to heaven or hell, but we all know make a statement at home, they flaunt their differences. In a church where you grew up dressing sharply, they dress down. When you grew up combing your hair when you’re in public, now you don’t. My point is — I don’t really care whether you dress down or don’t comb your hair any or every day of your life, but when you grew up living that way, you show love and respect by “falling in line” for a mere couple of hours at a church service. When you have to prove you can dress like you always do now and still walk in the doors of “home,” you tell all of us that wanted to think you were doing “OK,” that you really don’t want anything to do with us. You think we’re strange, off-the-wall, and we get the feeling you’ve appointed yourself as an ambassador of your new found liberty to show us what we’re missing. What it does, is show us we were mistaken for missing you in the first place.
I speak (write) this in love. If you’re reading this and disagreeing, look in the mirror and then ask yourself, “Why did I dress that way?” Are you so self-centered that you can’t give up a little fashion to show respect for your heritage?
You Think Too Much! 
This is a great post. I am happy to say that I traveled nine hours to visit my parents because I love them and I even happen to line up with most of their standards. Amen to your post!
During the Christmas season, my thoughts constantly go back to my friends at Fairhaven. I can’t wait to see what God is doing in and through His church at Chesterton, IN. The Fighting Fundamentalist is great, but being there is even better. Perhaps next years Preaching Conference. So I guess the song could be “I’ll be home for Conference.” Anyway, Merry Christmas!
This blog reminds me of the following verses in
Proverbs 30;11 There is a generation that curseth their father, and doth not bless their mother.
12 There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness.
13 There is a generation, O how lofty are their eyes! and their eyelids are lifted up.
14 There is a generation, whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw teeth as knives, to devour the poor from off the earth, and the needy from among men.
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They ironic thing is they may have totally “Made Something” of themselves, but they forget that it wasn’t what they did, but what others did for them, that helped them succeed in life.
Fairhaven was never my “home” church. My “home” church was destroyed by a wicked man. Fairhaven was what I had left. I would have been embarrassed to show up here without showing a little respect for what I was taught, even if I didn’t agree with it.
BTW nice blog layout PV.