What is worship? Here's the Merriam-Webster definition, a definition that fully explains the adoration, expectations, and activities of the idol worship that permeates the worldwide Santa Claus cult. Cults do not tell the truth.
In the Santa Claus cult, the parents (and older siblings) are priests (with businesses and advertising agencies reinforcing and cashing in on the seasonal lust and gluttony). It is mostly the parents who establish and reinforce the false religion of Santa Claus within the family, as parents brainwash their children (until the kids finally realize that the parents have been lying all along). As priests, the parents establish the familial rules and expectations within the greater context of the worldwide Santa Claus cult. Children who are fooled by the cult's lies, mantras, songs, rituals, and practices, are often looked at, with a wink, as blessed innocents safely tucked into their ignorant Santa Claus bliss. Facetiously or sarcastically, I might express the cult members success by saying, "Oh, isn't that cute! We fooled another child! We got her/his mind, heart, and spirit to look at, follow, and pray to the 'fat man in the red suit', instead of teaching the kid to look to God's Word and Jesus Christ. We succeeded in turning the kid to lust for worldly junk, and to ignore repentance from sin or trusting Christ."
In the Santa Claus cult, parents, and others, direct children to act as religious suppliants: to believe on, trust in, pray to, and expect direct actions by the false god Santa Claus. Familial and cult-wide teachings require the cult's believers to accept and promote Santa Claus as possessing supernatural powers that include the ability to make himself, animals, and his conveyance fly (and to do so around the whole world in one night). That idol is, also, imbued by believers with the ability to know everything that a child does 24/7/365. Sometimes, the threat of Santa Claus 'watching' is used to attempt to control children's behavior. In worldly cultish form, children, as suppliants, are worked into a feverish pitch of list making, letter writing, prayers, and the kids are told to expect that what they have requested of the Santa Claus idol is what they shall receive as gifts from him, according to each family's Christmas rituals and timing.
The elevation of anyone and anything to that level attempts to equate them with deity and is totally against what God tells us to do, for He has said, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me.": we are to ask and expect all things of Him, God. The idolatrous cult of the imaginary Santa Claus has stolen people's hearts, minds, and worship away from God and Jesus Christ. But, it is not just parents and families that are guilty of that pagan idolatry and active attacks on God's Christ (for God says that to worship anything other than Him and His Christ is an attack against God, even as He speaks about "dumb idols"). Our Federal, State, and Local governments, in the USA, have often bowed to secular pressures to remove references to and reminders of the Christ of Christmas, only to allow the erection Santa Claus idols instead. How is it logical, moral, or spiritual to erect a lie in place of the truth? This shows the depths to which secularism has permeated our lives, today, that we smile, shrug our shoulders, and support those who have attacked the truth of Christmas, as they put up their Santa Claus cult icons and idols. Where is the Christ of Christmas, Immanuel, who came "...to preach deliverance to the captives..."?
Sin and its lusts are at the root of the Santa Claus cult, feeding on the fevered, seasonal, religious worship of the Santa Claus idol. We need to repent of this evil and return to the Lord Jesus Christ. Instead of the Santa Claus nonsense, imagine a Christmas present being offered to a child whereby the giver were to say that he/she is the one giving that gift to that youngster.
Imagine the joy of knowing and thanking the giver. Imagine giving Jesus Christ the real credit for our God-given ability to give gifts to others, to tell the recipient that you're giving the gift in love for that person and because you appreciate the Divine love that God shows you in Jesus. Every good gift comes from God, picturing God's gift of Christ to us. I raise this point, because, anything that parents teach their children has a huge impact on what children choose to believe for themselves, later on.
Since I trusted Christ Jesus as my Savior (March 15, 1984), I have heard several people say that they rejected the Gospel message for a long time because of their childhood experiences in/with the Santa Claus cult. When they realized that their parents and others were lying to them about Santa Claus, then, for years, these souls threw out God, Christ, and Santa Claus, because they saw that their parents were just as false in their beliefs about God and Christ as they were about Santa Claus. It took those particular souls many years to finally put aside their childhood's idolatrous prejudicial experiences and to seek out God's Word for themselves. The Santa Claus cult basically teaches that deity is a genie in a bottle to be rubbed as desired, a false view of True Deity. Bless God that those souls were able to finally repent and receive Christ, despite the forced and enforced idolatry that had bound them to the Santa Clause cult in childhood. I was one of those idolatrous followers for years, but throwing out the True God and His Christ, along with the idol. It took decades for me to humble myself to read God's Word for myself and finally repent of my sin and receive the Living Christ. Now, I am free in Christ Jesus, never to be bound to spiritual lies again. Christ and His Word are my salvation, my foundation, my expectation. Please turn away from the Santa Claus cult, repent and return to our Creator, Immanuel, Jesus Christ.
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