How ought we to prepare ourselves to welcome the Lord and to celebrate His birth in a cave in Bethlehem ?

How ought we to prepare ourselves to welcome the Lord and to celebrate His birth in a cave in Bethlehem ?
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Christmas is fast approaching, with only a few weeks ahead.

Preparations for the approaching  Christmas have already begun.

How are we preparing?

By

Cleaning our houses, whitewashing or painting them if necessary,

Decorating them internally and externally,

Hanging plastic made colourful and lighted stars,

Getting ready things necessary to build an updated Crib for Baby Jesus to be born in,

Getting ready for luxurious and sumptuous Christmas meals,

Giving advance for Christmas cakes and sweets,

Sending Christmas greetings to our dear ones,

ana above all,

Purchasing costly new Christmas dress for all the family members.

Thousands or lacs of rupees,depending upon the social status of the  person, are spent for the celebration of the feast.

All the things noted above are the external preparations done for  any function.

Even for a marriage function we do the above things.

There is nothing Christian in them except that they are done before Christmas.

They must be Christianized by our internal preparation, which must be purely Christian.

What is meant by 'purely Christian'?

The preparations must be based on pure Christian values.

What is valued as Christ Himself valued is Christian value.

Jesus is the Creator of the world we live in.

We were created not to live in this world permanently.

We were created for the next world which will be our permanent abode.

This world, wherein we live, is only a means to be used for the attainment of the next world.

It is only a means to an end.  

Worldly minded people consider this world as an end in itself, without caring for the next world; they are attached to this world.

Detachment to this world is a Christian value.

'Blessed are the poor in spirit', Jesus has said.

Jesus has set an example by His life to be followed by us, His followers.

Christmas in truth is feast of a poor baby.

The richest God (Nobody can be richer than God as He is the owner of the whole universe) becomes poorest of the poor, not by disowning His creation, but by His poverty of spirit, to teach us how we should be.

If He has desired He could have been born of a rich virgin in a magnificent palace.

But He chose to born of a poor virgin,  in a cave, a residence of cattle.

He chose a poor manger to be His bed.

We must keep this fact in our mind when we prepare for the Christmas celebrations.

Luxury is not in keeping with the Christian value of any celebration in the Holy Name of Jesus.

We cannot meditate on poor Jesus, ourselves living in luxury.

So our Christmas celebrations must be simple,  not luxurious,

The first message about christ's birth was given to poor shepherds.

This shows christ's love for the poor.

Jesus wants us to share what we have  with the poor and the needy.

We must share the money spent on dress, food and our decorations with the poor. 

Our Christmas celebrations must be based on Jesus' commandment that we must love God and our neighbours.

Our love for our  neighbours must express itself in our acts of love and kindness.

Without our acts of love and kindness our Christmas celebrations cannot be pleasing to Jesus.

We must make use of Christmas as an opportunity to show our love for our neighbours, not to make a show of our ability to spend.

Internal spiritual preparation is more important than external material preparation.

We must make our heart fit to receive Baby Jesus by cleaning it by our act contrition and confession.

Celebrating Christmas without spiritual preparation is a waste of time and energy.

In short, our Christmas celebrations must be marked by

Spiritual purity,

Simplicity,

Love for God

and

Love for our neighbours.

Lourdu Selvam.