On Birthdays

Job 3:1  After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his [birth]day.

Today, the topic of birthdays came up, and I just thought I'd share my thoughts on the concept of celebrating one's birthday as it relates to Scripture.

 Firstly, I know of no Scripture that condemns, in an of itself, celebrating birthdays.  However, when I look at Scripture, it seems kinda pointless to me.  I've heard some people write in the past that the wicked celebrated birthdays, while the righteous cursed their birthday.

An example of the former being Herod in Matthew 14:6 and Mark 6:21-23.  Herod celebrated his birthday by asking his daughter Herodias what she wanted, because her dancing pleased him.  Herodias, prompted by her mother, asked her father for the head of John The Baptist.  Yeah, that backfired:

Mar 6:26  And the king was exceeding sorry; yet for his oath's sake, and for their sakes which sat with him, he would not reject her. 

However, not everyone in Scripture that celebrated their birthday was specifically counted as wicked.  Take the Pharaoh of Egypt, during the time of Joseph:

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. 

Now, an example of the latter, the righteous cursing their birthday, is listed in this post (Job).  Another example is Jeremiah:

Jer 20:14  Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.
Jer 20:15  Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad.

In fact, the Preacher of Ecclesiastes said that:

Ecc 7:1b ...the day of death [is better] than the day of one's birth.

So, at the very least, birthdays are weird.  

 

But do you know what's even weirder in this world, and possibly downright sad?

According to the Word of God, the observance of Good Friday, and more explicitly, of the Lord's Supper (I Corinthians 11:26) is technically BETTER than the observance of Christmas!

It's sad because people treat Christmas as a much bigger deal than even Easter!  Yes, they're both false holidays because of the worldliness and idolatry associated with the holiday (modern Nativity scenes are just a mash-up of the Truth, in essence creating a false Christ), mixed in with Scripture, but God considers Christmas EVEN WORSE, for that is a celebration of a birth, while Holy Week, leading up to Easter is more closely associated with a death and resurrection!

Now, a caveat:  It is no sin to celebrate a birth, and it is certainly no sin to celebrate the birth of Christ (just not in the way of the false Christian world).  But it's just weird, at least in my opinion.