[Darris McNeely] I couldn't even get out of my driveway this morning without picking up my neighbors trash and putting it back in his dumpster. And before I got out of my neighborhood I had to swerve around several bags of other neighbors' trash that were in the street because their dumpsters were overflowing. Why? Well, it's the day after Christmas. And everybody's dumpsters are overflowing with the trash, the refuse, the packaging that has been accumulated as a result of the Christmas holidays.

In fact, an article that I was reading before I got into my car this morning out of the Wall Street Journal was talking about holidays bringing a mountain of trash, that the back end side of Christmas isn't very pretty because of the Christmas trash that has proliferated in recent years because of the packaging, delivery boxes from Amazon, from FedEx, that even have upped the ante of the amount of trash that is accumulated at this time of the year as a result of the Christmas festivities.

And it brought to mind to me one point that so many people make about the Christmas celebrations as people try to keep Christ in Christmas, sort of put Him into Christmas, or all of the discussions and arguments that take place about that. And that is at least one valid point, that as people try to celebrate Christ's birth with the Christmas traditions, they wind up focusing their lives more upon themselves through all of the gift giving. And that's a legitimate point.

When you do read the Bible the account of Christ's birth that Luke and Matthew gives us, the gifts were given to Christ, and they were far different gifts than what we can imagine today, and the focus from those who did come and worship Christ was upon Him, and that's the most important thing. And so I guess this story of the holidays bringing mountains of trash, the Christmas trash that even I had to pick up and weave my way around today as I left my home points out a valid point that we might all learn as we kind of leave this season behind us once again for the year hopefully with a little bit more of a thought as you're watching this and as people think about exactly what they're doing to focus upon the story of Christ's birth, His life, and even His death and His resurrection means that we look at what the story tells us from the Bible, and we do what that says. And in doing so we learn something about God and His Son, not just about ourselves and putting the emphasis upon ourselves.

The Christmas trash that is accumulated as a result of all of the celebrations that take place at this time of year should teach us just how far we have strayed from that one central story that the Bible tells us about God sending His Son for the sins of all the world. That story is a far greater story and winds up with far greater value and something that we don't want to throw away.

That's BT Daily. Join us next time.