Christmas, what a wonderful time of the year. I pray you are planning to celebrate the coming of our Lord Jesus with family, friends, and gifts, yes make it a special time.
So often at this time of the year we are reminded that Jesus is the reason for the season, that we should remember the birth of Christ. While as accurate as this statement is, it falls woefully short of the true reason for the season. The real reason for the season is not simply that Jesus was born, it was that God robed in flesh came down to earth to dwell with men because prior to His coming we were a people without hope!
It was no random birth, of a random baby, in a random manger, born to random parents, for a random purpose. To understand Christmas is to understand it as God’s intervention in the catastrophic end of man!
Without a clear view of where the world was prior to the birth of Jesus Christ (Christmas) it is unrealistic to think that we could understand the magnitude of Christmas. If we heard the story of Jesus birth a thousand times, read, or taught a thousand different ways, never could we hear or know of the hopelessness of mankind, the need for a Savior, and the depth, width and breadth of God’s love and grace for His followers.
Genesis 2:1-3 tells us that at its creation the world and everything in it was perfect and free from sin, just as God had created it. However, the perfection of God’s creation was tainted by the evil one. Satan betrays God; he betrays Adam and Eve, and they commit the first sin of men. This is recorded in Genesis 3:1-6 As a result, God puts a curse (Genesis 3:13-19 on the earth as well as humankind. Therefore, Adam’s fall results in sin entering the world. Genesis 6:5-8 reveals just how depraved man had become; so much so, “The Lord was very sorry He had made man on the earth…” What a depressing and desolate picture of mankind here on earth.
So begins the chronicles of man and his journey. We see events such as the flood, the enslavement of Israel for 400 years, battles and wars, pestilence, and death.
Despite man and his sin, God through His prophets spread a message of a Messiah that would come and rescue men from their sin. At the last night of the nation of Israel’s bondage to Egypt God gives them a picture of that hope. We know it as the Passover. Exodus 12:1-13 Set free from slavery with fresh hope and dependency on God, we see the Ten Commandments or law were given by God to help His people live in a way to honor and glorify Him until the Savior came.
Because of the curse, man couldn’t please God. Man has a distinct inability to live according to the law, the commandments, because of their guilt was not only a result of their failed obedience and efforts, but it was also a result of the failed obedience of Adam, which the guilt of was placed on all mankind. The nature and desire to be disobedient, to be sinful, was imputed to all men. Romans 5:12 instructs us “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.”
Throughout the Old Testament a prophecy of hope was given of the One who would come and set at liberty men stuck in sins grasp. One who’s blood was so precious that it would be offered as a sacrifice, so precious and pure, that it would settle the sin debt of men once and for all! Continued in the New Testament is God’s instruction to man that the realization of this hope comes through faith in all that God has accomplished for us through His Son, Jesus Christ.
Christmas is not just the reason for the season! Christmas is about a single, undeniable moment in time, when God intervenes, and time is forever split! A Savior is born!
Merry Christmas!