At the turn of this century was also the turn of the secular Christmas holiday rush to start yet even earlier. The end September is now the launch for many business Christmas campaigns. Business owners and CEO's are driven to show their stockholders and board members a red arrow that is constantly pointing up on a PowerPoint chart to demonstrate to these people that they are doing their job well.

With this trend, by 2010 we will probably see Santa and his sleigh rolling out at the beginning of the first game in football season, just behind the player name announcements that are at the start of every game.

Whether we are business owners, CEO's, or consumers, we are also Christians, and need to readjust our focus on the true reason for the Christmas celebration. Our emphasis should be on the birth of Jesus Christ.

For business owners, the greed in making more money than we did this time last year seems to be the distracting factor. One passage in the Bible that states it best is Luke 18:24-25 (NCV), "It is very hard for rich people to enter the kingdom of God. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle tan for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God". For the individual, the greed and personal selfishness of what we are giving or getting is the distracting factor. Luke 12:15 (NCV) Jesus tells us: "Be careful and guard against all kinds of greed. Life is not measured by how much one owns."

Please don't take the statements above the wrong way. It is ok for us to get gifts, or give gifts to people that we care about during this celebration, as demonstrated by the Magi visiting the Christ child in Matthew 2:11 (NCV), "They came to the house where the child was and saw him with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped Him. They opened their gifts and gave Him treasures of gold, frankincense, and myrrh."

We also should try performing the best we can at our jobs. We just need to reinstate the true reason for this celebration and de-emphasize the secular version, and also remove our personal greed and selfishness. Romans 2:6 (NCV) tells us: "God will reward or punish every person for what that person has done. Some people, by always continuing to do good, live for God's glory, for honor, and for life that has no end. God will give them life forever. But other people are selfish. They refuse to follow truth and, instead, follow evil. God will give them his punishment and anger."