Becoming a grandparent this year for the second time was an amazing experience filled with tears of joy, love and adoration. It is an overwhelming experience to hold a newborn baby so fragile, helpless and totally dependent on its mother and father. It made me realise again the absolute humility and sacrifice that Jesus Christ made by coming to earth in the form of a baby.
Picture this, God in three persons – Father, Son and Holy Spirt – the creator of our planet earth, which sits just the right distance from the sun to sustain life, where water, land, plants, fish, birds and animals can live. Then came the creation of humanity, the pinnacle of all creation. That same creating God, even though the Son was God, did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position and was born as a human being.
This Christmas we desperately need a Saviour by acknowledging sin and anticipating the greatest declaration possible. Born is King Jesus, the wait is over, the Kingdom of God is among us. His birth; our birth. We were “helpless and dead in our sin” (Romans 5:6; 12), “without hope and without God in this world” (Ephesians 2:12), but the birth of Christ changes everything.
We typically wait until New Year’s Day to make resolutions, to start new habits, and to seek a fresh start but these often get tied purely to our own willpower, determination and effort. Perhaps that’s why so many of our resolutions fail. But Christmas invites us to new birth, because of the one birth that changed the world.
The babe of Bethlehem assures, enables and empowers our own re-birth… over and over. That’s something to celebrate. I am overwhelmed with the love of God to do this for humanity. That’s the Christmas message!