Skip to main content

The Purpose of Christmas

I don't know about you, but I often get lost in the details of living and lose sight of the big picture. Doing so results in spending a lot of energy in ensuring the details are correct, sometimes to the detriment of getting the job done. People, families, and churches can all fall into the trap of thinking that they must control every aspect of life, and life together. In so doing, they miss the grandeur of living and the blessings we have in God.

I have a chart that, in one page, illustrates Napolean's invasion of Russia in 1812. The uniqueness of the chart is that it includes a map, distances, geographic features, army strengths along the route, and climate information. In short, it portrays the entire campaign including the massive loss of life in one picture. With a little reflection, it is possible to grasp the enormity of that disaster for the French people. Viewing the chart provides the viewer with the "big picture," the complete story in one glimpse. I've used the chart in a couple classes to make the point that the Scripture writer is seeking to provide that big picture to his readers. In some cases my point has been that if Bible teachers are not providing their students with this kind of Gospel understanding, we need new teachers.

I find it helpful to create a similar illustration with students and clients outside my church. Using a Whiteboard, I trace two parallel concerns of God from Cain and Able through the letters of Paul. It becomes apparent that God's concerns have always been that we give Him our allegience and honor, and that we are gracious and compassionate in our dealings with others. In fact, if we are to "glorify God" and "imitate Christ," we must be steadfast in putting others first.

Christmas season is an appropriate time for this discussion. While the birth of our savior is itself a momentous in-breaking of God in this world, it is much more significant than the birth of a baby in Bethlehem.

Paul tells us that it had always been God's plan to send Jesus to reconcile mankind to God and to reconcile us to each other. In a real sense, we cannot be reconciled to God unless we are willing to be reconciled to each other. It becomes clear as we study Scripture that God is not so much interested in the details of our worship to Him as He is in our assuming a spiritual character that matches His. Jesus' birth is simply the beginning of His life, ministry, and death for us. His birth is a reminder not just of God's love for us, but of his love for the people sitting next to us, or those that live across the street, or those in our houses. His birth is a reminder that we too are to be other-centered, gracious givers rather than self promoters.

The season of His birth is not to be one of expectant getting, but of expectant giving. Expectant that our gifts to each other will bless one another; will let others see the grace of God in us so that they can join our worship of our God.

Perhaps that's the best reason to celebrate Christmas. Once the excitement has faded, to remind ourselves that we are called to enter others' worlds as accepting and nonjudgmental dispensers of grace.

Isn't that really the big picture of God's story?

Merry Christmas!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Obedience Rather Than Sacrifice

Saul it seems, was instructed to have the Israelite completely destroy the Amalekites – people and animals. Rather, Saul allowed the Israelites to capture the Amalekite king, and to bring back the choicest live stock. When Samuel returns to visit Saul, the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the cattle are clearly audible. Assuming that the Israelites had done what had been directed, Samuel finds this noise to be somewhat unexpected, and so he asks Saul to explain what has happened. Saul’s response is a two-parter. The first is that the people have brought back the best of the plunder to sacrifice it to God. The second is that Saul was afraid of the people and so he let them bring back the plunder [and in this explanation, we don’t know why]. Samuel’s response is his mission for God, and he will complete it. Samuel tells Saul that he has failed in his mission to destroy the Amalekites and as a result God has rejected him as king of Israel. In Samuel’s discussion with Saul, he says:

Elders redux

A reader (I am always amazed that people actually read this blog) submitted a rather long comment on the original post on Elders. It is apparent that the reader did some good homework as the comment has several, well, more than several, reference citations. It is clear that they both read the original post and did some Bible study before posting their comment. Because the comment was so long, I thought it appropriate to post another entry rather than bury the response in the comment log. In the following discussion, I have included the text of the comment without the Scripture references. If you want to read the comment in its entirety, scroll to the Elders post and click on the comment. --------------------------------------------------------- [Comment~~~~The church is expected to be a people in exactly this sense. We are the people of God who are charged with continuing and preserving the values, culture, hopes, and the identity of God’s people in our time.~~~~ Does this include th

Naaman's Dipping and Requests

The familiar story of Naaman dipping in the Jordan is a story with more than a few twists. Let's review the story first. Naaman we are told had been used by YHWH to punish Israel and our story describes him as a man of valor in high regard by his boss, the King of Syria the current thorn in the side of Israel. It turns out though that Naaman suffers from some sort of leprosy.  On one of Syria's raids into Israel, the Syrians captured an Jewish girl who had found her way into Naaman's household as a servant for his wife. Knowing of Naaman's illness, she suggests to her matron that there is a prophet in Israel who could help him. This message gets transmitted to Naaman who takes it to his boss. The boss - the king of Syria, tells Naaman to travel to Israel and gives him a letter to Israel's king directing that Naaman be healed. Upon Naaman's arrival in Israel he gives the letter to Israel's king who reacts in a panic. He does not even consider finding t