What does this time of year mean to you? Is it presents, family, or friends that matter the most? Or perhaps you do choose to celebrate the birth of the Risen Savior. BUT, have you ever stopped to wonder what Christmas really means to you and those whom this day is truly about?
Have you ever wondered what it meant for Mary, Joseph, the Shepherds, the Angles, and even God Himself to see the events unfolding at the first Christmas? What about now, what do you think Christ thinks of how commercialized we have become over this most wondrous of days?
Think about it. Mary is a young girl of around 13, who finds out that she is pregnant, after NOT being with a man. Let me restate that! Mary has done NOTHING to get herself pregnant, in that ‘sticky’ situation of motherhood, yet she finds herself in that spot! Do you think she was ashamed, unwilling to go through with this gift that was to be given to her? How would YOU feel if it was you in Mary’s shoes?
Then there is her betrothed Joseph! He finds out that his fiancée, the girl that he loves is pregnant by what he thinks is another man! How would YOU feel if you were in their shoes? Would you be willing to love that woman that “betrayed” you no matter what? Come on, be real here! Would you say, “YES LORD!” they way that both Mary and Joseph so eloquently did and allow God to have you participate in the miracle of the life of Christ, or would you run and hide from the gift that God had for you?
What if you were a Shepherd, seeing the night sky fill up with angels proclaiming that the Messiah has come, BUT, He is born in a stinky, smelly, nasty barn! Would you want to run and tell others that you have seen God’s gift to the world, or would you run and hide?
What about the Angles, those heavenly creations that witnessed their King be born in the barn! Have you ever thought about why they marvel at us silly humans, why they are so curious as to our ability to accept Christ? Have you ever wondered what they felt witnessing God’s answer to our sin in fruition, only to see our trite response to it now?
What of God Himself? Have you thought, seriously considered how much He REALLY loved you? Christ loved you enough to leave all the riches of Heaven, to be born into that stinky smelly barn, to be parented by two young teenage kids, to go to the Cross. Have you thought about Him at all this Christmas season?
I want to challenge you, that IF you have not accepted Christ as your Savior, you have indeed hid from the greatest Christmas gift that anyone could be given! John 3:16 is one of the most beautiful quoted scriptures of all times, but it is just the beginning!
“For God so LOVED the world, that He GAVE His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him, shall not perish but have eternal life….. (keep reading)….For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, BUT that ht world through Him might be saved!” John 3:16-17
WOW! God came as a baby at Christmas not to condemn the world, BUT to save the world? From what? Look around you! Do you see the suffering, the evil, the SIN! That is exactly why Christ came, why He was born to die, to save the world from its sin.
So let me ask you again, as you celebrate this Christmas, have you accepted God’s greatest gift? Do you have to ask What Does This Day Mean to God, or do you know?
