Welcome to the holidays.

I feel for the children of today. For most of the year, you’re so bogged down with homework, projects, tuition, and CCAs that when you’re finally allowed off the hamster wheel and you finally get a few weeks off school, you’re so exhausted that you just rush off to do anything that does not reek of responsibility, commitment or expectation.

Your holidays are no real break at all. You put down your schoolbag only to find you’ve still got a weight on your shoulders – the burden of the next school year, and how that affects what school you’ll go to next, and how that affects the rest of your life.

That’s too much responsibility to bear in December, so many of you will just overdose on social media feeds, gaming, online videos, shopping, movies.

But surely there’s more you can do with your holidays than drowning your stress in waves of booze, adventure, or travel. Now you’ve set aside your schoolbooks for the year, how about picking up the one book that really matters?

Maybe it’s completely against the spirit of holidays to hit the books. But I’m not talking about any ordinary book. It’s the best novel you’ll read. It’s history, poetry, violence, love, betrayal, prophecy and redemption packed into a timeless epic.

BEHOLD, THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD

The gospel of John opens with these powerful words:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” (John 1:1-4)

The Bible you have, whether in well-worn pages, dusty covers, or in a smartphone app, is the living word of God. Its pages are a record of God’s power, love, creation, and humanity’s road to redemption. It is God’s light and life for mankind.
Jesus explained that without His light, we are spiritually blind.

“For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.” (Matthew 13:15)

In humility and hunger, ask God to open your mind to the scriptures (Luke 22:45), that you may read and understand them (Matthew 13:19). Look for inspired teachers of the Word, like Philip to the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8), who connected Word and testimony. With the eunuch’s heart and mind able to comprehend the meaning behind the promised Messiah, the Word came to life.

It’s the best novel you’ll read. It’s history, poetry, violence, love, betrayal, prophecy and redemption packed into a timeless epic.

You’re young, and maybe you’re just a student, but God has much in store for you. How will you find out His plans and promises?

Read on! Whenever you have time on your hands – like during your holidays – commit to know His Word, which are the keys to light and life. Pray for the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16) and begin the lifelong process of unpacking its wealth of parables and mysteries.

The greatest story ever told is not yet finished. You are a key character in it, and the most exciting chapter is yet to come: You get to live out the Word.

GO WHERE HE LEADS

In James 1, we are reminded to be “doers of the Word”, and that the pure religion to God is for us “to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world”. James adds that faith without works is dead (James 2:26).

The heart of God is for justice, holiness, and restoration of the world, and He calls us to be His hands and feet.

The holidays are an opportunity for you to take a leap of faith out of your comfort zone. This holiday season, get your hands to the shovel and feet into the muck. We’ve got work to do!

So think hard, think big, think from the perspective of eternity.

But this not a call to just “YOLO” your way through the holidays. Before you rush into doing every single “Christian thing” you can find – like signing up for a youth camp or mission trip – first consider how what you’re doing will grow you into your God-given calling. God does not call us to do everything, only to go where He leads.

Doing God’s will often means denying our own will – our wants, ambitions, bucket-list and even our standards of goodness – for His perfect unfailing love, righteousness, and justice (Jeremiah 9:24). We don’t pull God along to bible study or missions; we move alongside Him.

Remember that whatever you set out to do during the holidays, know that the question of how to best spend your time is not just a question for the holiday season, but something you should keep asking for the rest of your life.

So think hard, think big, think from the perspective of eternity.

It’s the holidays. The original phrase was “holy days”. Now make your holidays count. Dig deep into His Word. Learn to walk closely with Him – surrendered to His will, sensitive to the Holy Spirit, and going only where He leads. Expose yourself to experiences that will let you taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8).