Give It Up for Jesus!

Ever applaud at the wrong time? Christmas Day is the right time to applaud, and, according to the psalmist, no one deserves it more than God.

It's Christmas Day and we're here to give it up for Jesus!

Chances are that at some point over the last several weeks of the Advent season you've attended some kind of artistic performance at the end of which the audience was inspired, or felt obligated, to applaud.

Perhaps the artists were first-graders at the elementary school participating in a holiday program. Applause. Maybe they were members of the middle school band trying to play in tune. Applause.

Or, the performance might have been your own church's Christmas program which featured kids dressed as shepherds and angels wearing bathrobes and towels and a miniature Mary and Joseph who were 8 and 10 years old. Mary was holding a baby doll which was standing in for baby Jesus. You applauded.

Perhaps the artists were accomplished musicians and singers. You heard a choir with orchestra render Handel's Messiah. At the end, you applauded.

Applauding is usually the appropriate thing to do. Not to applaud would be horribly and insufferably ...