Christmas and Work: Taking Christmas Back to Work with Us

Most of us get time off at Christmas. We get at least a day or two of vacation. Some of us stretch our holiday break to a week or even more, visiting relatives or heading for the ski slopes.

Then we go back to work. Christmas is over, or so it seems. But is there a way to take Christmas back to work with us? I’m not thinking about playing Christmas music in January or greeting people with “Merry Christmas” throughout the year. Rather, I’m wondering how the reality of Christmas might transform our experience of our work.

In Luke 2:17-20 we see examples of people who experienced the first Christmas before going back to work. Mary, we’re told, “treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart” (2:19). Though Luke doesn’t say it explicitly, we rightly infer that she did her treasuring and pondering while caring for her newborn infant, which is no small act of work. 

Perhaps you might continue to “treasure” and “ponder” the good news of Christmas when you’re back out your daily work. Perhaps you could rejoice in the truth of Emmanuel, God with us, always, even as you tackle your email inbox, impatient boss, or lengthened to-do lists.

The shepherds also went back to work after they experienced the glory of the first Christmas. On their way back to the fields, they “spread the word concerning what had been told them” (2:17). When they made it back to the place where their flocks were gathered, the shepherds were “glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen” (2:20). Yes, they were once again working, taking care of their sheep, but their work was now filled with praise.

Perhaps you could find ways to praise and glorify God in your daily work. What if you were to take a five-minute break in the middle of the day to offer thanks and praise for God’s gifts? What if you were to pray at the beginning and middle of your day, “Dear Lord, be glorified in all I do at work today”?

I’m all for taking time off at Christmas. But the good news of Christmas is that God entered into real, full, ordinary human life through Jesus, the Son of God. God isn’t present only in special holidays, but in every facet of our lives, including our work.