As I look out over the church yard and see the snow falling I am reminded of the old Irving Berlin tune, “White Christmas.”  In the movie “Holiday Inn” Bing Crosby sang a new tune in this 1942 film that birthed the song we all know and love at this time of year. In 1954, the movie, “White Christmas” first showed in theaters with Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen starring as a successful song-and-dance team who become romantically involved with a sister act and team up to save the failing Vermont inn of their former commanding general.

I write all of this to show how unimportant things can become important. 

When Crosby first heard Berlin play “White Christmas” in 1941 at the first rehearsals, he did not immediately recognize its full potential.  Crosby simply said, “I don’t think we have any problems with that one, Irving.” 

The big song had been expected to be “Be Careful, It’s My Heart.”  While that song did very well, it was “White Christmas” that topped the charts in October 1942 and stayed there for eleven weeks.

As I dream of a White Christmas; I’m reminded of how it’s not the snow that will make this a white Christmas for me. No, that’s not the important part.  The only thing that can make me white as snow is the sacrifice of my Saviour.  In Isaiah 1:18, Scripture tells us, “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”

Isn’t that great news?!  God so loved us that He gave His only begotten Son so that if we would simply believe on Him we would have everlasting life.  Believing that Jesus died on the cross for your sins, that He was buried and that He arose from the tomb on the 3rd day is the reasoning that our heavenly Father calls us to do with Him.  As we reason within our hearts what God has done for us and accept His free gift our sins are washed away and we are left in His presence as white as snow.

My prayer this Christmas is not that your Christmases be white because of the snow but that your Christmases and every other day in your life be white as snow because of the genuine encounter that you’ve experienced with the risen Saviour and our Lord, Jesus Christ, who is the only reason for this season.

May you and yours have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.