Clarification on Whether it is Wrong to Gather with Family and Friends on Holidays

[Posted April 5, 2024]

Hello Mike…I hope you and Sandi are doing well!

I was wondering if the IWWB family of elders, brothers, and sisters are all on board with your personal response in concern of… “Is it Wrong to Gather with Family and Friends on Holidays?”

I was always of the belief that to participate by being part of (ie: physical presence) the festivities at any pagan holiday/traditions of men was something to avoid…even if we don’t actually participate in the fanfare of such… I, too, always assumed that we should never get involved in any type of Babylonian worldly matters…even at the cost of being shunned and persecuted for our spiritual understanding of the Word of God.

I, too, missed the point entirely through the years of the fact that God’s Word approves of such practice…meaning being involved to the point of actively being at a ‘traditions of men’ event if invited!

I’m a bit confused over it all and would appreciate any further insight you would care to give.

Thank you very much, Mike, and God bless.

YbitC
M____

Hi M____

The elders have all discussed this subject extensively and have come to see that Christ went to every holy day event just because that was the best time to reach the most people with His message which He knew would be rejected. Nevertheless, He went up in the middle of the feast and declared on the last great day of the feast of Tabernacles that any who would come to Him… “out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters” giving life to all men:

Joh 7:37  In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
Joh 7:38  He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
Joh 7:39  (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)

Paul informs us that we can indeed attend a feast ‘if we are so disposed’:

1Co 10:27  If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go; whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience sake.

Romans 14 and Galatians 4 make it clear that the Lord’s elect do not themselves keep days, months, times nor years:

Rom 14:1  Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations.
Rom 14:2  For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs.
Rom 14:3  Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him.
Rom 14:4  Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand.
Rom 14:5  One man [who is weak in the faith] esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.

It does not require being strong in the faith to observe days, months, times or years. It requires great faith to abstain from following the traditions of men:

Col 2:8  Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments [G4747: stoicheion] of the world, and not after Christ.

These “traditions of men and rudiments of the world are clearly defined in Galatians 4 as “days, months, times and years”:

Gal 4:9  But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements [G4747: stoicheion], whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Gal 4:10  Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.
Gal 4:11  I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain.

If we follow in the footsteps of Christ and His apostles then we will declare Christ to be “Lord of the sabbath” and we willing to be rejected of family and friends, for letting them know that we do not observe days, months, times or years, just as Christ was rejected of His family and the society of His day. Yet we can, and at times we should, attend the feasts of unbelievers “if [we] are disposed to go” for the purpose of serving as an example of the love of Christ for His creatures. It is obviously all a matter of what is in our heart. Are we attending out of fear of rejection or are we attending to display the love of Christ? The Lord only knows the hearts of men, and He is quite capable of judging each of us based upon our motivations.

That is the consensus of our elders, and yes, we are all “speaking the same thing, we are of one mind and of the same judgment.”

1Co 1:10  Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.

YbiChrist, Mike

Hello Mike…Thank you so very much for the spiritual clarification in concern of my inquiry.

I will admit that I have always believed to stay clear of any type of traditions of men in whatever flavor they were made up of… I really do not know how I came to that conclusion but now feel like a “fool” for avoiding all of my family and friends over the many past years for not showing up to holiday/birthday functions when asked!

I do have another question though…

In Job, all of his children were killed on the ‘appointed day’ of one of his sons. I always believed it was a birthday celebration. Were the children destroyed because of the celebration on ‘his day’? If so how can we then attend such activities knowing that day only brings about bondage and spiritual destruction per-se?

Thank you, Mike!

ybitC…M____

Hi, M____,

I am pleased to hear that you realize how Christ and the apostles dealt with this subject. I pray you will continue to follow in the Lord’s footsteps and use the traditions of men as an opportunity to witness against those traditions by simply letting your family and friends know that your presence is not for the purpose of following men. Your presence with your family and friends on their traditional days is for the purpose of showing Christ’s love to them, just as Christ was in the synagogue every sabbath for the very purpose of healing people and telling them to pick up their bed contrary to the law of Moses.

Concerning Job’s sons, it is true they all died on the eldest sons [birth] day:

Job 1:4  And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day; and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.

Job 1:13  And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house:
Job 1:14  And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them:
Job 1:15  And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

Joseph told Pharaoh’s baker that he would be be hanged, and that took place on Pharaoh’s birthday:

Gen 40:16  When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was good, he said unto Joseph, I also was in my dream, and, behold, I had three white baskets on my head:
Gen 40:17  And in the uppermost basket there was of all manner of bakemeats for Pharaoh; and the birds did eat them out of the basket upon my head.
Gen 40:18  And Joseph answered and said, This is the interpretation thereof: The three baskets are three days:
Gen 40:19  Yet within three days shall Pharaoh lift up thy head from off thee, and shall hang thee on a tree; and the birds shall eat thy flesh from off thee.
Gen 40:20  And it came to pass the third day, which was Pharaoh’s birthday, that he made a feast unto all his servants: and he lifted up the head of the chief butler and of the chief baker among his servants.
Gen 40:21  And he restored the chief butler unto his butlership again; and he gave the cup into Pharaoh’s hand:
Gen 40:22  But he hanged the chief baker: as Joseph had interpreted to them.

In these stories, we are not the celebrants. We are Joseph, who foresaw what would happen on Pharaoh’s birthday, and we are signified by the messenger who escaped to tell Job of the death of his sons.

It is also incredibly instructive that the holy spirit has not given us the birthdays of even one person in all of scripture; not Adam, not Noah, not Abraham nor any of the patriarchs, judges, kings, prophets, and not even the Lord Himself, nor any of His apostles. There is a reason for that, and here is that reason:

Gal 4:9  But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Gal 4:10  Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.
Gal 4:11  I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain.

John the Baptist was beheaded on Herod’s birthday, but John never wavered in his witness of Christ as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Joh 1:29  The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

Joh 1:36  And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God!

We, too, must be willing to die for what we believe, and the death of John signifies how we die daily, offer our bodies as a living sacrifice to God, and count ourselves as crucified with Him.

The “souls under the altar” signify all who have died daily with Christ and who have lived out the rejection and persecution promised to all who will be given to stay faithful to the end. They are not all necessarily literally killed for their testimony. The world hates the Lord’s elect, and that is what the Lord counts as murder:

1Jn 3:15  Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.

Rev 6:9  And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held:
Rev 6:10  And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
Rev 6:11  And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

Again, “The Lord looks on the heart” and judges accordingly:

1Sa 16:7  But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.

So do not be ashamed that you have missed a lot of opportunities to be with your family. You did what you did with a pure heart, and that is what you should continue to do with your new-found understanding. Do all that you do “as unto the Lord.”

Col 3:23  And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;

I have made the very same mistake, but I, too, did it with the desire to please the Lord and to fear Him more than men, and the Lord knows that is still true.

Your brother who struggles with you,
Mike