Joy to the world* - Andy Peterson

A group of Chinese students has criticised a rise in Christmas revelry, urging people to "resist Western cultural invasion", state media says.

I became quite indignant when i read the aforesaid in a news article in BBC Online here. It din help when the article ended with the following statement:-

Western festivals like Christmas and Valentine's Day have been enthusiastically embraced by Chinese retailers and young people alike in recent years.

By stating that, BBC News seem to confirm that Christmas is a "Western festival"! What the....???

I guess the commercialised, frivilous and hedonestic celebration on 25th December every year is a Western culture - if they want the credit for it - but please, Christmas is not a Western festival. Not in it's purest sense.

If we are to take Christmas for what it is, i.e. the celebration of the birth of Jesus, then isn't it clear it's not a Western culture?

When Jesus was born, it took place in Bethlehem. Not in the Western world. Jesus was a born from Jewish parents, not Western. Wise men from the East (not the West) came to visit the baby Jesus.

So how can one say it's a Western festival????

So is it a Middle-Eastern festival? No - cuz Jesus was born to bring eternal life to the whole world. That is why we sing that joy has come to the world! The whole world. For whoever believes in him will have everlasting life (John 3v16).

May this Christmas bring you much joy!

p/s - praise God that me dad is out of the hospital - but he's not out of the woods yet so please continue to pray. Cheers, maties!

p/p/s - pic taken in Galleries La Fayette, Paris of a multi storey X'mas tree. A western practice?!

*Andy's version is one of the most creative versions i've ever heard - just vocals and a bass guitar (with all the techniques - plucking, snapping, tapping, slapping).