Starting this weekend, the holiday season is officially upon us—Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years!
We call them holidays because historically these days were holy days. They were days that we committed specifically to God. They were days on which we reflected just a little more deeply on our faith. They were days that we tried to live a little more faithfully as followers of God.
Here’s the thing. I’ve got nothing against taking certain days and thinking more deeply about our faith on those particular days. But too often, focusing on our faith only on “holy days” means we end up focusing on our faith very little on the “regular” days.
But as God’s people, we’re called to treat every day as a holy day, aren’t we? Every day is a day to focus on our relationship with God. Every day is a day to reflect on who God is and how much he loves us. Every day is a day for us to live out our calling as God’s people.
And, believe it or not, that’s what it is to live missionally. It is to recognize that every day we are called to live out God’s love and compassion and justice in the world around us. It is to live out the ethics and holiness of Jesus among our neighbors. It is to invite our neighbors into the reality that every day has been made holy by God and every day is an opportunity for us to bless this world.
Let’s celebrate our holidays with passion. But let’s not forget to live every day with passion—passion for God and passion for the world we’ve been called to bless!
