Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year. Churches must be assertive, unyielding, and unapologetic in presenting a Savior who came upon a midnight clear. For some reason, lots of people want to strip Christmas of its historical and spiritual heritage. And many more fight tooth and nail to "keep" Christ is Christmas. But I want to say for the record that it’s actually pretty hard to get Christ out of Christmas.

• The word Christmas spells our Savior’s name in its first six letters.
• If they want to call it a holiday, let’s remind them that the word is derived from the words “holy day,” and it refers to the holiness of the birth of Christ.
• If they want to call it Yuletide, that’s the old phrase for the 12 days of Christmas—the Feast of the Nativity.
• If they want to talk about the seasonal holiday, we’ll tell them how Jesus is “the reason for the season.”
• If they want to talk about Santa Claus, let’s explain that there really was a Christian named Saint Nicholas in the city of Myra, Turkey, in the fourth century, who was famous for his generous gifts to the poor.
• If they want to talk about gift-giving, tell them about the Magi who brought the first Christmas gifts to the Christchild.
• If they talk about the songs and sounds of the season, tell them about the first choirs that filled the Bethlehem skies on the night Christ was born.
• And if they want to use the abbreviation Xmas, point out that the “X” is the Greek letter Chi, which is the first letter and the symbol of Christ.

It will be pretty hard to get Christ out of Christmas, especially if we take full advantage at my church and yours as we shout it from the mountaintop and spread abroad the good tidings of comfort and joy.