Merry Christmas!
What’s that you say?
Christmas is over? Indeed it is
not! The radio stations may have stopped
playing Christmas music (for which some of us are thankful!) but now is the actual Christmas season! Indeed, as I write this it is the 4th
Day of Christmas (so you better go buy five gold rings to be ready for
tomorrow!)
If you were here on Christmas Eve, you got to hear me talk
about Christmas being the time of new beginnings. And while I will gladly wish you a Happy New
Year, I stand by my statement that New Year is truly overrated and artificial
as a new beginning.
What happened on Christmas changed everything. That is where we can find a real new
beginning! The miracle of the
incarnation (from the Latin for, “to take on flesh”) shows that God will dare
much to redeem us.
You want to know how much God loves you? Look in that manger! God loves you so much that He gave His only
begotten Son for us. Think of how
humbling an experience this was for God, the Second Person of the Trinity, whom
we know as Jesus. He went from being
present in all places and all times to locating himself in the womb of a
virgin. He was born – naked and cold,
with all the indignity we too experienced in our births. (Don’t get me wrong, birth is beautiful and amazing,
but it’s hard to call it a dignified process!)
He was the king of the universe and yet, that night he was wrapped in
rags and, since there was no room for them in the inn, his mother placed him in
feed trough. Jesus gladly endured all of
that (and so much more as an adult on the cross) for you and me.
Jesus truly is infinite, without beginning and without end,
but because of His love for us He chose to take that first breath the day He
was born. That same love moved Him to
take His last breath on the cross.
I would argue that it is again that same love that caused
him to take His first victorious breath in the tomb. It was not enough for us to know that Jesus
was born for us and that He died for us.
We also need to know that He rose for us, showed Himself alive for us,
ascended back into heaven for us, and will come again for us. Not only that, He has a mission for us: “As you are going about life, make disciples
of all nations. You shall be my
witnesses.” (Paraphrasing Matthew 28
& Acts 1) That is, we need to know
these things if we want a full understanding of the height, depth and breadth
of God’s love for us!
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day may be past, along with the
Feast of Stephen. Today is Childermas –
the day set aside to remember the slaughter of the children of Bethlehem. And the Christmas season marches on. On Sunday we will remember Jesus’
circumcision and naming. His
presentation at the temple and recognition by Simeon and Anna (Luke 2) are part
of Christmas. But every day is a day to
celebrate God’s great gift given to us through the Son.
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