The Holiness of Christmas

There’s something beautifully familiar about Christmas—long-beloved carols, family traditions, classic movies we return to year after year. Familiarity brings with it a sense of security, expectancy, and nostalgia. But before all of that—before the traditions and the glow—Christmas entered the world through everyday, unassuming moments of first-century life. Heaven did not arrive with spectacle; it quietly stepped into history. The common occurrences that had been unfolding for months, decades, and even centuries suddenly became holy in the hands of our sovereign God.

That reality presses us to ask an important question: What does holy actually mean?

For a long time, I thought I knew. If you had asked me a few years ago, I would have described holy as perfect and divine, or morally right and pure. But after reading Holier Than Thou by Jackie Hill Perry, my understanding shifted. That book didn’t just redefine a word for me—it reshaped my view of God, sharpened my discernment, and deepened my love for Him.

Sometimes the clearest way to define a word is by understanding what it is not. The strongest antonym for holy is not necessarily evil or profane, but common. Holy is better described as set apart—distinct, other. Scripture gives us a helpful picture of this in Exodus 20:8–11:
“Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy… Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath and declared it holy.”

The point of the Sabbath was not to elevate one day of the week as more perfect or divine than the others. Rather, it was to set apart a day consecrated to the Lord—a day marked as distinct in the hearts of Israel. The Sabbath became a living proclamation, not only to Israel but to surrounding nations, about the nature of the one true God and how utterly different He is.

Seen through that lens, Christmas takes on new meaning.

Everything about Jesus is holy—set apart, distinct, other. From the very first moments of His life that we celebrate at Christmas to His long-awaited return, He is like no other. And remarkably, His holiness did not avoid the ordinary; it entered it. In Christ, God took what was familiar and common and revealed it as sacred.