How many of you have noticed that there is something going on in the world right now? They call it “Christmas.” They like to say, “‘Tis the Season,” right? “‘Tis the Season to be jolly,” they say.

They have their reasons for joy, some which may be okay reasons, but other reasons may not be so upright. So, they like to say, “‘Tis the Season.”

We have often heard “Jesus is the Reason for the Season.” You might see that on billboards and different places throughout, especially in front of churches and things like that. But if you do any research at all about the origins of the holiday of Christmas, you find out there is actually another reason for the season.

I feel it is important that we research the origins of things. Scripture says don’t learn the way of the heathen (and that is in Jeremiah 10, which we will be getting to). But the problem is our culture long ago already learned the way of the heathen, and from the time we were children many of us learned the way of the heathen.

And so, we have to find out the origins of things to make sure that we haven’t been practicing the way of the heathen. So, I want to share today that this Christmas tradition is actually a way of the heathen.

And the way you find out whether or not something is actually a way of the heathen is to investigate. So, we are going to investigate here.

In the Encyclopedia Britannica, a very respected encyclopedia, it says, here: “During the later periods of roman history, sun worship gained an importance and ultimately led to what has been called a solar monotheism.”

It is one thing to have monotheism, which is the belief that there is only one true Elohim. Some suggest that we are monotheistic because we only believe in one Elohim. But it is another thing to say it is a solar monotheism.

You see, there was the influence of Judaism and Christianity that was sort of merging together. And this merging of faiths produced monotheism, but there were solar gods kind of mixed in.

It says: “Nearly all the gods of the period were possessed of solar qualities, and both christ and mithra acquired the traits of solar deities.”

“Acquired the traits of solar deities.” Yuck! “The traits”– that means the character of solar gods (sun gods). It goes on to say:

“The feasts of Sol and Victus (open unconquered sun) on December 25th, was celebrated with great joy (’tis the season to be jolly). And eventually this date was taken over by the Christians.”

So, the idea of this time of year producing great joy is actually rooted in paganism. Now, there is nothing wrong in being joyful and jolly and happy. And that is a good thing.

But I remember the old days when I was a heathen. There were a lot of things we laughed about that wasn’t something I consider to be something to be funny today or something to be rejoicing about today.

I have heard it said, “America is going to hell, and they are laughing all the way.” And so, the mere presence of joy alone is not an indicator that it is a holy laughter, a holy joy, a holy happiness, because the devil offers us his treats, which may seem to make one happy for a time, but in the end it’s only a trick.

It doesn’t produce everlasting joy. An everlasting joy is the joy of Yahweh, and that is the fruit of His Spirit. And so, what I have found in examining this is that in reality, Jesus is not the reason for the season. Treason is the reason for the season. There has been a merging of faiths. And that merging of faiths is nothing short of treason.

Before the Feast of Tabernacles, last September (late September, the last couple weeks of September), I couldn’t believe my eyes as I walked into the Wal-Mart, and there they already had Santa Claus and different Christmas items available for sale. And it just became fall.

I mean, it was just the very last week of September, or maybe even a week before then. It gets earlier and earlier every year. Of course, the idea is they want to get you into this “Christmas spirit” as soon as possible because they want to make the money, you see, that is accompanied with that holiday.

And they figure if they kind of beat everybody else to the punch– “Oh yeah, Christmas is coming up soon this year. I might as well buy this now.” They want you to come in and buy your Christmas gifts so you can kind of pull them out of the red and into the black.

In accounting, if someone is in the red that means they are losing money. And when they are not in the red, they are making money. And so, that is why they call it “Black Friday.”

So coming up this coming week many businesses will begin to go into the black while many consumers end up going into the red. And the banks, because the consumers have gone into the red, they will continue to be in the black, also.

You know, there are actually businesses that lose money all year long, but then when Christmas comes they make up for it. It is a very commercialized holiday. Don’t the Scriptures say something about money being the root of all kinds of evil? Yes, it does.

And so, we see then from this quote that I gave there were two competing ideologies, two competing religions, and they (the sun god worshippers) were saying, “Okay, there is one god. There are not many. There is one, but he is a sun god.”

Then the believers in Messiah were saying, “Well, actually, the Messiah is a little bit like the one you worship in.” And then they made this merging of faith.

But when I read this, that Messiah is acquiring the traits of solar deities, for me there is like… ding, ding, ding, ding, ding… alarm bells going off everywhere in my head because the Messiah is not supposed to acquire traits of solar deities. You can’t mix the two together. They don’t mix.

You can’t mix lies and truth. You can’t mix light and darkness. I guess the Christians thought they could get more converts by Christianizing various idolatrous pagan festivals and try to make Messiah more attractive to them.

And we kind of see that today even. You know, there is a Christian version of everything. There is a Christian rock-and-roll. There are even Christian magicians and Christian tattoo parlors– all kinds of things Christianized.

But the truth is, they did not Christianize a pagan holiday. They really didn’t. What they did was, they paganized the Messiah. Why would we want the Messiah to take on the character traits of any sun god?

For someone to attach the attribute of an idol is to put Messiah in this position, here, of taking on the attributes of the Kingdom of Satan, and that is nothing short of treason. That is not where Messiah belongs.

The Messiah is warring against the Kingdom of Satan– the demon worship, the idols, the false images, the false theology, the character of sun gods, the festivals to sun gods. He is warring against these things, and what do they do? They move Messiah into that. It is TREASON! That is all it is. It is treason.

What is treason? Treason is subjecting yourself to a government that is not your government at the expense of subjecting yourself to the government of your own country. It is betraying the cause of your own king and choosing instead to pay homage to the king of another nation.

And for them to take Messiah (Kingdom of Yahweh), and move Him over to this side (Kingdom of Satan) so that He takes on the character traits of idols from another kingdom is nothing short of TREASON! We should be disregarding what pagans do, not memorializing them by incorporating them into our faith.

So, by observing this Christmas holiday, we are memorializing satanic theology. This practice of mixing religions is called syncretism. Syncretism is, and I quote from the dictionary: “The attempted reconciliation or union of different or opposing principles, practices, or parties, as in philosophy or religion.” (Source: dictionary.com)

And one of the practices observed by idol worshippers was reconciled in their own minds to Messiah. This is wrong. If it was wrong then, it is wrong now. Sin does not die of old age.

We see in Exodus Chapter 32 an example of syncretism in the Bible. We are going to learn that Aaron taught the people the way of the heathen. Of course, they knew the way of the heathen already.

Exodus 32:3 – So all the people broke off the golden earrings which [were] in their ears, and brought [them] to Aaron.

4 – And he received [the gold] from their hand, and he fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made a molded calf. Then they said, This [is] your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!

So, we see here that he is declaring that Yahweh brought them out of Egypt, but he is giving them something they are more familiar with– a molded calf.

Exodus 32:5 – So when Aaron saw [it], he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, Tomorrow [is] a feast to YAHWEH.

So, they are referring to this golden calf as being Yahweh. That is called syncretism. It is where you take elements of a false faith of idolatry and mold it together into something that would be Biblical, of the truth.

And notice here that it says: “Tomorrow is a feast.” Often times when syncretism takes place, there are going to be alternative holidays attached to those syncretistic ideas.

So, he invented a feast day. It was mid-summer here. It was after they had Pentecost, the giving of the Torah. And so, here we are– the festival, which is a holiday, and the syncretism.

We see the same thing again in Jeroboam’s day.

1Kings 12:28 – Therefore the king asked advice, made two calves of gold, and said to the people, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up from the land of Egypt!

Once again, the calves. And once again, declaring that these calves are the ones that brought them out of Egypt and saying, “You don’t want to go to Jerusalem. Here you go, right here. Here are your gods.” Syncretism.

1Kings 12:29 – And he set up one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan.

30 – Now this thing became a sin, for the people went [to worship] before the one as far as Dan.

31 – He made shrines on the high places, and made priests from every class of people, who were not of the sons of Levi.

What did he do next? He ordained a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month. Not the seventh month. The eighth month.

1Kings 12:32 – Jeroboam ordained a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the feast that [was] in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. So he did at Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made. And at Bethel he installed the priests of the high places which he had made.

Syncretism. And once again, a holiday is attached.

Now you notice in each instance a golden calf was used. It was presented as one that brought them out of the land of Egypt. Well, the Egyptians actually worshipped an idol named Apis Bull, and I was reading this morning where Apis Bull would often be depicted as having a sun disc between its horns.

The Apis Bull was actually believed to be the manifestation of a deceased king. Now, I’m telling you this for a reason. The Apis Bull would have this sun disc behind its head, between the horns. And so, how is the Messiah depicted do we see often? We see a dead king on a crucifix having a sun disc behind His head.

This halo is also seen in the Egyptian ankh, which, if you look here, this is an actual drawing by Egyptians, and they have in their hand this ankh… if you can see it clearly enough, it looks like a cross, but it has a loop or a circle at the top. That is the halo, which is above the cross.

A modern depiction of Messiah is that He is hanging on a cross and at the top of His head there is a halo or sun disc. I don’t really want to show you the crucifix because it is, actually, biblically speaking, an obscene image. It is an abomination.

But the Messiah is depicted as a naked man hanging on a cross with a halo or sun disc behind His head, and they were doing this same iconography in ancient Egypt.

There is actually a connection between the modern depiction of the Messiah and what the Israelites were doing in the wilderness in worshipping the golden calf. There was syncretism. There was the calf, which had the halo behind its head.

And we have today syncretism– alternative holidays that are not found in the Bible nor inspired by the Bible nor commanded in the Bible nor observed by any first century believer.

And this Johnny-come-lately syncretistic religious idea of Messiah being born on December 25 and that we need to celebrate this birth of Messiah and giving Him the characteristics of pagan sun gods is an absolute abomination.

It is not recognizing the difference between the holy and the profane. It is the mixture of the profane things into the holy Son of Elohim. And in my mind, this is extremely offensive. It is treason. And so, treason is the reason for the season.

How many of us believe, also, that there is more than one way to cause Yahweh to be molded into a pagan image, not just in the physical form, but also in the character that we believe He represents?

We believe that the Messiah represents a holy character, a biblically based character, and we don’t have to physically create an image in order for it to be idolatry in our minds. It is very common for people to want to mold Yahweh into the image that suits them rather than letting Him define Himself.

They don’t accept what the Scriptures may say about Him and instead create their own image of Him that is nowhere found in Scripture. That is what has been done to the Messiah, and Christmas is just one example of how a false image of the Messiah has been created.

There is a true image and there is a false image. The true image of Messiah was when He was born in the spring or the fall. You can determine that by understanding the course of Abiyah, of which was the father of John the Baptist, and when he got the visit from the angel and doing a little math… nine months later… and then six months after that.

Whereas the false image of Messiah has Him born in the middle of winter on December 25th, the time right after the winter solstice, when the sun goes further away and then starts coming back.

New sun gods are born. December 25th, Messiah is born– the same time the sun gods begin making their trek toward the Northern Hemisphere and new sun gods are created. This is just one example.

I want to say, first of all, before I even say this, I want to explain to you that if we have some kind of false image of who Messiah is, I’m not here to tell you that you are condemned and that you are going to hell until you straighten up.

I am here to tell you that because you do love Messiah, because you do care about Him, because He is the object of your affections, that when you find out about this, you would want to know, first of all, because you love Him.

And once you know, you would not want to continue following Him in this way, as if He were taking on the traits of solar deities, because He has nothing to do with that.

And so, I believe with all my heart that Yahweh can accept us right where we are, with all of our false ideas, as long as we receive Messiah, understanding that He is the One that delivers us from all transgression, and we turn our hearts away from sin and toward righteousness.

He can meet us right there no matter how many messed-up images and thoughts we have about Him, as long as we understand, He is the One through whom we receive forgiveness of sin, and He is the One whom we need to start turning toward righteousness. And we might not fully understand what all that means.

And so, I’m not saying these things to condemn anyone. I am saying these things in faith that there are listeners to the broadcast and listeners to the archives of this broadcast today who love Messiah, and they don’t want to see Him take on the character traits of idols and demons and any other false things that would be attributed to Him.

For instance, they suggest Easter. We know, biblically speaking, He was raised on the day of firstfruits, but instead, they have named a day, this word “Easter,” for the day of resurrection.

Actually, the name “Easter” comes from a pagan idol called “Astarte,” which is a goddess, a female deity, the goddess of fertility, and they actually call it “Easter,” which is basically the name of a false mighty one. We don’t want Messiah taking on the character traits of fertility goddesses.

That is why they have the rabbits, which are very fertile, and the eggs and other fertility symbols going on associated with this so-called holiday. It is nothing more than syncretism and treason against Messiah. We don’t want any part of that.

The true Messiah says that He came in His Father’s name (in John 5:43). But there is another Messiah. Again, I am not saying that because you use the name “Jesus” that you are following a different Messiah altogether and He can’t accept you right where you are.

What I am saying is, it is just interesting that Yahushua says He comes in His Father’s name, and there is this other name called “Jesus” where you will never see the name of the Father in.

With the name of “Yahushua” we have “Yahweh,” which is the Father’s name. With the name of “Jesus,” you don’t have anything. So, another false character trait.

And then, we have the true Messiah wearing short hair and wearing tassels. The false Messiah is wearing long hair and having a Greek toga draped around Him.

There is the true Messiah, which upheld Sabbath observance. And there is a false image of Him, which changed the Sabbath to Sunday.

There is a true Messiah where Yahweh is His Elohim. He is the one bowing before, praying to and worshipping Yahweh. But then there is a false image of the Messiah, which makes Him 1/3rd of a triune “God,” which is not biblical.

He referred to Yahweh as His Elohim. You see, if you want to call Him “God,” well, why would a god need a god? A god doesn’t need a god. But Yahweh is the Mighty One, and the One that Messiah Himself worshipped.

Now, Yahushua is exalted above all. All power is given to Him in heaven and earth. We are to worship Messiah and to receive Him fully. He has a special divinity, I guess you could say, above us in that He is omnipresent, but He is not part of a trinity.

Yahushua upheld the Law as the righteous standard for everyone. But a false image would say He abolished the Law and replaced it with a new law.

His followers, in reality, will reign with Him as Kings and Priests in a Torah-observant Kingdom on the earth. Torah is the Hebrew word for “law.” So, we are observing the Law of Yahweh in the Bible. We are keeping the Old Testament laws on the earth with Messiah. You can read about that– Zechariah 14, Isaiah 66.

But what we are taught today is His followers look forward to living with Him only in heaven, floating on clouds and playing harps.

By the time you add it all up, it equals a false image of what Messiah truly is. And this is not all. These are just some key examples.

Now what this comparison really is, is a comparison between truth and lies. And there is only one way you can discover the truth and that is: Set aside what you may have been taught about Him and let the Scriptures alone define Him. Not culture. Not modern day theology. Not Roman Catholic Church. And not the Protestant daughters of the Church.

We need to let the true Messiah shine forth toward us out of the Scriptures. We need to receive Him in fullness and seek to depart from anything that would be a false or pagan representation of Him.

The 144,000 says they were not defiled with women. They were not defiled with false religions. In Revelation, the woman represents a congregation of people, a Bride. There is the harlot woman, and then there is the true Bride.

We don’t want any part of the harlot woman in our faith. We want to let only the true Messiah, the one that is manifesting Himself in the pages of Scripture, be the Messiah that we are following, and that alone.

Yahushua prayed that we would be sanctified by Yahweh’s truth. And He said in John 17:17, when He is praying to Yahweh:

John 17:17 – Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.

He is saying, “Your word is truth.” In fact, Yahushua is a manifestation of the Living Word of Elohim. He is the Word of Elohim that came forth from Elohim and was made manifest and dwelled among us and became flesh.

John 14:6 – Yahushua said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

And so, we want no part of the kingdom of darkness. We don’t want any part of the kingdom of darkness influencing what we do. But that is not what happened in the third and fourth centuries.

They allowed part of what the kingdom of darkness had begun influence what they were doing. No one was observing anything called Christmas until they saw the heathen and learned their works and started to imitate them and inject that, through syncretism, into the faith, the true faith. And that is not the only example. That is just one example.

The devil is all about lies. You see, the Messiah was not born December 25th. That is a lie. And so, his claw prints (or fingerprints or signature) is all over this thing.

2Thessalonians 2:9 – The coming of the [lawless one] is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders,

10 – and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.

Are you catching this? You have to have a love for the truth in order to be saved. If we don’t have a love for the truth, what happens next?

2Thessalonians 2:11 – And for this reason Elohim will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie,

If you don’t love the truth, Yahweh will allow you to be deluded, and you will believe a lie.

2Thessalonians 2:12 – that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

Because there is pleasure in unrighteousness. Because the devil offers us his treats. People want it. And there is some fleshly pleasure that goes along with the ways of the enemy, but it does not last.

And so, we have Satan and his wonders and signs. All have to do with lies. Yahushua having everything to do with truth. And so, to which do we want to cling? To truth or to lies?

Was Messiah born on December 25th? Is that true? No, it is not. We must love the truth and not mix the Messiah in with the lie.

Our hearts become accustomed to saying, “Oh, pfft. It doesn’t matter. It’s okay.” Isn’t that what Satan said in the Garden of Eden? “Oh, it doesn’t matter. You will not surely die. Go ahead. Partake of the fruit.”

So whether we cleave to truth or to lies is very important. If we don’t have that love of the truth and cleave to that, we may not be saved. That is a salvational thing according to the Scripture here.

That is not the only way satanic fingerprints are all over this holiday. It is not the only way in which his signature is to be uncovered underneath all the little “’tis the season to be joyful.”

There is another thing that is out there today called “Santa.” That is nothing but a lie.

And then another “god” of this world, money, is spent in abundance. And the children of this age will rejoice because they are going to have their coveted desires fulfilled with the world’s goods.

And we have all the other trappings that go along with this holiday– the decorations (which they try to make pleasant to the eye), streets and homes decorated with trees and lights, and nativity scenes and the like. And for those of us who don’t participate, it is just vexing to the soul.

But we need to somehow communicate this. I mean, has anyone thought to consult Yahweh? What does He think about this? That would be a really good question for your friends and your relatives.

“Has anyone thought to consult Messiah, what He might think about the whole thing according to the Scriptures, because what I see in Scriptures, it would not be something He is real happy about.” That opens a doorway for sharing.

Now, this week might be your best time to share, because you get them after they bought all their gifts and everything, and they are like, “Uh, well… ” There is that going on. Or… maybe after this is over.

It is like witnessing to, for lack of a better example, a drunk while he is getting drunk in a bar and telling him that it is wrong. In the middle of them doing it is very hard, but we have to give an answer for the hope that is in us and share.

And maybe they will just think as the days go on, and then they look at their bank account, and then they look at the Scriptures (hopefully more than their bank account), and they may say, “You know, this is an oppressive holiday.”

Interestingly, the Christmas observance is even observed by those who don’t even believe in the Messiah– atheists and secular humanists, and modern pagans will hail this time as the time of the winter solstice.

These are all traditions and a lot of people, they just want to, you know, like an ostrich, sort of bury their head in the sand and pretend like nothing is going on around you that is bad. But we have these traditions that have been handed down to us and we have to look at them.

Yahushua did. He looked at the traditions that were going on, and He didn’t like some of the traditions that were being passed down.

Matthew 15:1 – Then the scribes and Pharisees who were from Jerusalem came to Yahushua, saying,

2 – Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.

3 – He answered and said to them, Why do you also transgress the commandment of Elohim because of your tradition?

And so, we see here that the people of Messiah’s day were not pleased that Yahushua’s disciples were violating the traditions of the elders.

Today, many of them may ask you. If you hear this study and you put it into practice (if you have already, I don’t know), they may ask you, “Why don’t you keep to Christmas? Why don’t you keep the traditions of the elders?”

Now, with the leaders Yahushua was very direct. “Why do you transgress the commandment of Elohim because of your tradition?” And our answer is, actually, very similar. He was a little hard on the ones who were the teachers. Why do we think we can transgress the commandments while we keep our traditions? That would be wrong to do that.

And Yahushua said to those Scribes and to those Pharisees:

Matthew 15:7 – Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:

8 – `These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with [their] lips, But their heart is far from Me.

9 – And in vain they worship Me, Teaching [as] doctrines the commandments of men.’

Nothing new under the sun, is there?

I understand the Christmas celebration is honoring with the lips, but lip service isn’t all that Yahweh is asking for. He wants our heart.

And if in our heart– we know this is lies; we know this is syncretism; this is the mixing of religions; this is an attempt to paganize the Messiah.

We know in our heart that’s wrong, rather than allowing our heart to be far from His will and teach as doctrines the commandments of men and thereby engage in a worship that is nothing but vanity and vainness– it is all futile.

We need to turn our hearts toward Elohim, and let’s love Him with all of our heart, all of our soul and all of our strength, rather than turning our heart from the Scriptures.

I know, the pressure of the world is strong. But these are the little heart tests that Yahweh is putting before us to see whether or not we will do His commandments or not.

The heart of Christmas is in materialism. It is in falsehood. It is idolatry and syncretism and vanity and covetousness. You can search from Genesis to Revelation and you won’t find one birth date for the Messiah, nor a command to celebrate His birthday.

And yet, today, most who claim to believe in Him do celebrate that birthday. So, who converted who? The idea of celebrating a “god’s” birth– where did THAT come from? It came strictly from paganism.

The devil worshippers had their way with the Christians and pressured them into accepting their holidays. And so, don’t let it trickle down to you to where you feel pressured to practice what modern Christians are practicing. Otherwise, we are doing the same thing only it is second-hand.

The truth is Satan has been trying to creep his lies, his worship, into the worship of Yahweh ever since the Garden of Eden, and we need to be far removed from any practice that he would invent or inspire men to invent.

Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10:14:

1Corinthians 10:14 – Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

Run as fast as you can away from it. Christmas is not fleeing from idolatry. It is embracing idolatry. Now, you may not be worshipping the idol, but you are incorporating the character traits of that idol into the One you worship. Not that much different, is it?

Our children need to be taught purity, truth and the ways of life. Not profane things. Not lies. Not doctrines of demons.

1John 5:21 – Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.

So, we need to keep ourselves far, far, far from idols or idolatrous practices, not mix them into the worship of Yahweh.

True believers ought to be teaching unbelievers the true way of Yahweh, rather than unbelievers teaching believers pagan customs and observances and practices.

Now, if Christianity in the third or fourth century already had holidays that were biblically based– Passover, Pentecost, Feast of Trumpets, Feast of Tabernacles, and so on– they would not have felt the need to adopt some kind of celebration.

But instead, they came out of this heathenistic culture, and they decided to bring their junk with them. We are told in Scripture, in Ephesians Chapter 5, Verse 8, it says:

Ephesians 5:8 – For you were once darkness, but now [you are] light in Yahweh. Walk as children of light

9 – (for the fruit of the Spirit [is] in all goodness, righteousness, and truth),

Truth! Truth! Truth is, He wasn’t born December 25th. You are celebrating a lie.

Ephesians 5:10 – finding out what is acceptable to Yahweh.

Find out what is acceptable to the Master. Is this really acceptable, that we would mix Him in or mix paganism and Him together? It says:

Ephesians 5:11 – And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose [them].

Today, I, Tom Martincic, am choosing to expose them, rather than having fellowship with them.

You should never try to take something that is a total abomination to Yahweh, which these festivals were (Saturnalia and Sol and Vectus, and what not), and try to honor Him with it. He is not honored by that, as though in order for us to honor Yahweh we need to find out the way Satan is honored with his worship and then pick that up. No!

You can’t honor Yahweh with that. He receives no honor from doing such things. Yahweh already has His Festivals. It’s just that most people ignore them.

So, because there is this void there, Christians took over the feasts of Sol and Vectus with the gift giving, yule log, mistletoe, all these things, and they tried to clean it up somehow. But the truth is, Scripture says:

2Corinthians 6:14 – Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness?

15 – And what accord has Messiah with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever?

You can’t clean it up. You just can’t.

2Corinthians 6:16 – And what agreement has the temple of Elohim with idols? For you are the temple of the living Elohim. As Elohim has said: I will dwell in them And walk among [them]. I will be their Elohim, And they shall be My people.

17 – Therefore Come out from among them And be separate, says YAHWEH. Do not touch what is unclean, And I will receive you.

These are unclean things invented by unclean spirits. And you can’t bring a clean thing out of an unclean.

Job 14:4 – Who can bring a clean [thing] out of an unclean? No one!

So, we don’t join with those who participate in the celebration of these things. If it was wrong then, it is wrong now. Oh, some people say, “Well, it’s been so long. Nobody even thinks of the idols anymore.”

Well, let’s suppose it was wrong then and not wrong now. Tell me, please, what year did it suddenly become okay? Was it the year 800, maybe? or 900? I mean, it started back in the 300’s. So what year did it suddenly change from an abomination that Yahweh hated to something that He is, like, accepting– “Oh, yeah, go and do that”?

When did Yahweh change? When did the sin finally die of old age? It doesn’t. Sin is still sin. I don’t care how long people practice it. And from what I understand, Yahushua is the same yesterday, today and forever.

If He didn’t like it then, He doesn’t like it now. I don’t care how you dress it up. If we suggest that it changed, then we suggest that Yahweh changes.

I know some of you are probably going to be invited to Christmas parties at work and with relatives, but what I read in Scripture, there, is we shouldn’t have fellowship with unfruitful works that actually have their origination in darkness, unless we want to go there and expose it all. You would not be the life of the party, I would imagine.

You can do it in a humble way. Listen, they don’t know better. They are just doing what everyone else does. We don’t have to come at them with an iron fist and with our eighty-five pound sword ready to destroy anybody. We can come up to them with the spirit of humility and meekness because we were doing the same thing, most of us, at one time.

But they assume because it is popular (Oh, everybody else is doing it, you know, just follow the crowd)– it must be okay. But as I have heard it said, what is popular is not always right and what is right is not always popular. Yahweh is not looking for a popularity contest here. What He tells us to do is not necessarily going to be popular.

What we need to do is be careful that we are not falling into the same trap that the Christians were in the 300’s (336) in adopting this holiday, which is conforming ourselves to the world.

Romans 12:2 – And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what [is] that good and acceptable and perfect will of Elohim.

See, they didn’t do that in the year 336. They were not willing to prove the thing which was good and acceptable. Their minds were not transformed by Yahweh’s Spirit. They were conformed to the world, and that is why they picked up the celebration and tried to Christianize it. But they didn’t Christianize the holiday. They only paganized the Messiah.

Most pastors will acknowledge the pagan roots of that observance. The question is whether or not it matters. And as many will tell you, “Oh, what’s so bad about it, you know?”

People say, “Oh, the children. They look forward to it. They have a good time. How can you neglect your children by letting them be the oddball? It’s child abuse for you to make them suffer like that.”

And to that I want to say this: Excuse me, but what should we be teaching our children? Truth or lies? Conformity to the world or a life transformed by the renewing of our mind? What should we be teaching our children? To walk down the broad path that everybody else is on or be willing to take the narrow path that few find?

What should we be teaching our children? Follow a crowd to do wrong or follow Yahushua the Messiah and be willing to suffer at the hands of others even if it means they take our lives?

Exodus 23:7 – Keep yourself far from a false matter; do not kill the innocent and righteous. For I will not justify the wicked.

If there is something that is false, we don’t want anything to do with it. He was not born December 25th. That is the first sign of who inspired this whole thing. And we keep ourselves far from the false matter. And it says, “Do not kill the innocent and righteous. For I will not justify the wicked.”

That is bearing false witness. That is what the context is– bearing false witness. And it is bearing false witness to say He was born December 25th and to act like it’s His birthday and to have big celebrations, when in reality it is the supposed birthday of various sun gods.

So why would we want to give the perfect, holy Son of Elohim the attributes of an idol? We don’t.

And the fact that Scripture does not give us the date of His birth, does not tell us anything about when He was born, to me is quite telling because, after all, Yahushua knew that there would be millions and millions and millions of people who would want to celebrate His birthday. He knew that.

And yet, Scripture is silent as to what day that really was. If He really wanted us to, I am sure He would have given us the day. But He didn’t. He already gave us Holy Days. He already gave us Days in which to honor Him. But for too many, it’s too Jewish.

Scripture says (talking about the communion or the Passover):

1Corinthians 11:24 – and when He had given thanks, He broke [it] and said, Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.

And this is something that occurred, actually, on the Day of Passover. So what is it that we are supposed to be doing? Most of the world ignores Passover and chooses a demonic holiday based on lies, rather than the Passover, which is based on truth.

Yahushua says, “Memorialize My death.” He never says anything about memorializing His birth.

Now, they will do this. They will take the cup and do that in remembrance of Him. But they do it every week on Sunday? That’s not in the Bible. This is Passover. But most of the world ignores Passover and instead runs and chases this December 25th day and invents their own commands.

But this whole holiday is simply a way of the heathen. In Jeremiah Chapter 10, Verse 2, Yahweh says:

Jeremiah 10:2 – Thus says YAHWEH: Do not learn the way of the Gentiles; Do not be dismayed at the signs of heaven, For the Gentiles are dismayed at them.

See, they knew. They were watching the sun set further and further away from them, further and further south. They thought the sun was, maybe, going away and wouldn’t come back. And so, when the sun began to make its trek back toward the Northern Hemisphere– “Ah, a new sun god was born.”

And that is why they associated their sun gods on December 25th, which is right after the solstices and everything starts coming back. And that is why the Messiah was said to be born on that day because He took on the attributes and character traits of solar monotheism. And what do we have?

Jeremiah 10:3 – For the customs of the peoples [are] futile; For [one] cuts a tree from the forest, The work of the hands of the workman, with the ax.

4 – They decorate it with silver and gold; They fasten it with nails and hammers So that it will not topple.

Sound familiar? It ought to. Now, what Jeremiah is referring to may or may not be specifically a Christmas tree, but it has all the attributes of one– decorating with silver and gold, cutting a tree out of a forest and then fastening it with nails and hammers so that it won’t topple.

So, he is actually describing for us, here, a practice that specifically is a way of the heathen. And yet, what do we have people doing today? Practicing a way of the heathen that Yahweh specifically said was a way of the heathen.

We could take this verse to an extreme. Now, unless I read verses 3 and 4, I would never have learned that this is the way of the heathen. I can read the Bible and find out there are practices in the Bible that are true from Yahweh, and then there are practices that Yahweh condemns.

And through what He is condemning, He may share with us something that is a way of the heathen. So it is not wrong to learn the way of the heathen if our intent is to get the heathenism out of our life. But it is wrong to seek the way of the heathen that you might copy what they do.

So, He says don’t even worry about it. Don’t practice it. Don’t learn it, let alone practice it.

Now, if you are trying to discover whether or not you are doing some way of the heathen, yeah, okay, but there is no other reason to find out about all these things.

And so, they have these evergreen trees, which seemed to them like they were impervious to the winter because they remain green. And I’m sure that, because of the sun going away, they were dismayed at the signs of heaven.

And they have these evergreen trees now decorated at this time of the year. I don’t believe this is just mere coincidence. This is Satan laughing at us in our cultures today. And it is a vain custom. It is a vain custom.

Remember what Yahushua said about “they worship Me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men”? To me, it is just no coincidence. There is not really much irony. I think it is just there. People are doing the same thing that Yahweh condemned.

Some would say, “Well, EliYah, actually that was a man taking an ax and he was molding and shaping the idol out with the ax.” So what? You are still taking the tree and you are decking it with silver and gold, whether it is in the shape of an idol or whether you have the leaves still on it or whatever you are doing.

You still have the way of the heathen, an element that is called specifically in the Bible a way of the heathen. And so, we don’t need any prophet to come along today and tell us how wrong that is.

And you don’t have to do a lot of research to find that Santa, the one associated with Christmas, this Santa figure, is an idol. I mean, after all, Santa is already “God” to many of the children of this world.

And I don’t think it is just a coincidence, here, that you move that “n” to the end and you have a little different twist on the word “Santa,” which is “Satan.” But the real evidence that Santa is satanic is the lies that are beneath him.

Purposely, parents will deliberately lie to their children and tell them they need to fear Santa Clause because “he knows if you’ve been bad or good.” And these same parents will also lie to their children about the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. Then they wonder why their children become liars and have a hard time believing that Elohim is real.

To me, that is an utter abomination to Yahweh. You don’t have to look very far into the Word to find out how much He loathes idolatry. Yahweh is the only true Mighty One.

What they have done is they have put Santa, a false image, a false god, in that position– the one who “knows when you’re sleeping, knows when you’re awake, knows if you’ve been bad or good.” He is making his list and rewarding you with worldly goods if you’ve been good and wise.

But if you have not been good, then he will not leave you with anything, or what I was told when I was a little boy was he would give me orange peels and something or other. I don’t know.

But I just know that this is an utter abomination. YAHWEH is the watcher of men. YAHWEH is the watcher of morality. HE is the one who keeps the record books. Not Satan’s Claws (Santa Clause). YAHWEH is the one who is omnipresent. Not Santa Clause or any other idol.

Our children look to us. They are completely innocent. And so, why would any believer want to teach their children to fear Santa Clause? Why would any believer want to teach their children that Santa Clause is omnipresent and knows if you are sleeping or awake and knows if you have been bad or been good?

Our children look to us and they believe every word we say. Don’t they deserve the truth? Absolutely!

And so, brethren, I say to you, and if you are doing this: It is a total abomination for any believer to teach their children to fear Santa Clause, and in so doing, creep an idol into the conscience of a child.

Scripture says:

Mark 9:42 – But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.

I give strong words because Yahushua gave strong words. And so, people of this world, take away the abominations and the stumbling blocks. Take away the stumbling block from the feet of the children. You have been warned. Everything is a lie. Everything about the Christmas holiday is a lie with one exception: The Messiah was born.

Everything else is lies. He was not born December 25th. He did not ask us to celebrate His birthday. He did not tell us to go set up a tree in our house and decorate it with silver and gold or houses with anything. Santa Clause does not exist. He doesn’t have reindeer that fly. There is no Rudolph.

He isn’t going to fit down your chimney on December 25th and leave any gifts. It is a waste of time to leave any cookies. He is not going to be coming down your chimney. It is a lie. And so, who is the originator of this holiday? Is it Yahweh? Whose signature is on this holiday? Is it Yahweh or is it the father of lies?

Yahushua said to His disciples, or to the ones claiming to be His disciples, but they weren’t:

John 8:44 – You are of [your] father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own [resources], for he is a liar and the father of it.

He is the father of lies. Therefore, he is the father of Christmas, which is founded upon lies.

The ones in John 8, they thought they were doing right. They didn’t think they were doing things that were wrong. The Scribes and the Pharisees. The people who thought they were doing the right thing. But Yahushua recognized the lies behind what they were doing and their murderous intents, I would add.

Revelation 22:14 – Blessed [are] those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.

15 – But outside [are] dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.

Do we want to love Christmas? Do we want to practice Christmas? If we do so, we are loving and we are practicing something that is nothing but one big fat lie.

Does that matter to us? “Oh, well, we don’t know what day He was born, so let’s just pick one.” You didn’t just pick one. You picked the day of the sun gods and caused the Messiah to acquire the traits of solar deities, demons. You didn’t just pick one.

So, the adversary speaks lies and inspires others to speak them as well. It is so important, brothers, that we are speakers of the truth and keepers of the truth and that we beware of lies. And when we discover a lie, we should have nothing to do with it because we want to keep ourselves far from a false matter.

It is the hallmark of Gentiles to be following things that are not true and much of the roots of the modern Christian religion today. I don’t mean to offend anybody or say that you’re lost or you’re going to hell. I don’t necessarily believe that, as I shared at the beginning here. But we have inherited lies, worthless and unprofitable things.

Jeremiah 16:19 – O YAHWEH, my strength and my fortress, My refuge in the day of affliction, The Gentiles shall come to You From the ends of the earth and say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, Worthlessness and unprofitable [things].

20 – Will a man make gods for himself, Which [are] not gods?

21 – Therefore behold, I will this once cause them to know, I will cause them to know My hand and My might; And they shall know that My name [is] YAHWEH.

I have shared with you in other broadcasts and throughout the website that His name is Yahweh. And the revelation that there are worthless and unprofitable things is another thing that I have sought to share with you, things that are found in idolatry.

And so, why don’t we call upon the name of Yahweh, forsake the traditions (many of which are founded upon lies), and seek to walk in the truth?

You know, David is lifted up as a good example of faithfulness by many believers in the Messiah today, with the exception of his error with Bathsheba. What was his attitude toward lies? David writes:

Psalms 101:7 – He who works deceit shall not dwell within my house; He who tells lies shall not continue in my presence.

We want no part of it. But the people of this world will naturally follow lies. We see in the Book of Revelation that those who hate Yahweh will rejoice when the two witnesses die.

Revelation 11:10 – And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them, make merry, and send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth.

What does “make merry and send gifts to one another” sound like to you? What were these prophets teaching them that was preventing them from making merry and sending gifts to eachother? I think we can figure that out and just do the math.

Revelation 11:11 – Now after the three-and-a-half days the breath of life from Elohim entered them, and they stood on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them.

I found that these pagan practices are finding their way into Chanukah, also. Now the Jews (many of them, not all of them) have the Chanukah bush, and they give gifts to eachother– Chanukah gifts.

And Chanukah, which originally was the Feast of Dedication, has kind of morphed into a Christmas replacement or a Christmas alternative. And the whole story about the oil lasting eight days, we don’t really know that was even true. It may not have been true. It is actually not found in Scripture. It is not even found in the Talmud.

It is just some idea that somebody developed, some tradition. So, I’m okay if you want us to give thanks to Yahweh for having the Temple rededicated and all that, but all these other trappings that go along with it, no thanks. I’ll pass.

Now, the Bible is very specific about why we should not, and that we should not, take pagan practices and incorporate them into the worship of Elohim. In Deuteronomy Chapter 12, Verse 29, He told the children of Israel:

Deuteronomy 12:29 – When YAHWEH your Elohim cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess, and you displace them and dwell in their land,

30 – take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, `How did these nations serve their gods? I also will do likewise.’

Don’t even try to find out how they were worshipping their gods, and then try and incorporate that somehow into worshipping Yahweh.

Yahweh says:

Deuteronomy 12:31 – You shall not worship YAHWEH your Elohim in that way; for every abomination to YAHWEH which He hates they have done to their gods; for they burn even their sons and daughters in the fire to their gods.

You don’t do it that way. He already gave you observances. “You don’t worship Me that way.” And He gives examples why. That is the way of the heathen. Don’t go along with those things.

Deuteronomy 12:32 – Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it.

You shall not add to it nor take away from it. But what has happened today, brothers and sisters, is they have taken away the Holy Feasts of Yahweh, and they have added feasts that have no foundation or command from Scripture, but have their roots in the worship of demons.

You don’t take a way of the heathen and try to honor Yahweh with it. He is not honored with that. We do not walk as the Gentiles walk. He who says he abides in Him ought to walk just as Messiah walked.

1John 2:6 – He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.

All paganism is actually satanism. In 1 Corinthians Chapter 10, Verse 14, it says:

1Corinthians 10:14 – Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

He gives as examples, here:

1Corinthians 10:15 – I speak as to wise men; judge for yourselves what I say.

16 – The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Messiah? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Messiah?

That is talking about partaking of the Passover Lamb. Yahushua is our Passover. So, he is referring to a biblical holiday– a holyday that is found in Scripture.

1Corinthians 10:17 – For we, [though] many, are one bread [and] one body; for we all partake of that one bread.

18 – Observe Israel after the flesh: Are not those who eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar?

Talking about the true faith.

1Corinthians 10:19 – What am I saying then? That an idol is anything, or what is offered to idols is anything?

1Corinthians 10:20 – Rather, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to demons and not to Elohim, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons.

21 – You cannot drink the cup of YAHWEH and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of YAHWEH’S table and of the table of demons.

22 – Or do we provoke YAHWEH to jealousy? Are we stronger than He?

Are we catching what is being said here? He is comparing the practices of heathen religions, which involves the worship toward and sacrifice to demons, and partaking of the Messiah and His sacrifice, which is the cup of Yahweh.

And you cannot partake of Yahweh’s table and the table of demons. If something was offered up to a demon, don’t try to take that and honor Yahweh with it. You cannot partake of both tables. You must choose one or the other. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t.

And so, in light of our comparison, there are true Holy Days and there are false holidays. There are Biblical Festivals and Holidays that are rooted in the worship of Yahweh, manifesting the true character of our Master, Yahushua the Messiah, so that we might be faithful to our Master and Savior Yahushua the Messiah.

Those Biblical Festivals rooted in the true worship, that’s all great. That’s what we want. But then there are non-Biblical festivals and holidays that are rooted in the worship of devils, manifesting a totally false character of the Messiah, causing us to commit treason against our Master and Savior Yahushua the Messiah.

We have two tables sitting before us now. I ask you the question: Can you really drink from both tables? You cannot drink the cup of Yahweh and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the Master’s table, Yahweh’s table, and the table of demons. You are not stronger than He. You cannot redefine Him.

Trying to redefine Him as something that He is not, is provoking Yahweh to jealousy. Let’s not do that. Let’s take Yahweh’s pure, unadulterated cup of truth, and let that be our drink of choice, from this time forth and forever more.

And as we do so, my brothers and sisters, may Yahweh bless you, and may Yahweh truly have mercy on us all.