The true gift this Christmas
Today is Christmas Eve and I am on vacation. Vacation is such a wonderful word. We are visiting family this year and we are relaxing and laughing and being loved on by some wonderful people that make the exhaustion of life fade away and I can feel myself being restored.
I have always been reminded that Christmas is not about gifts but just one true gift. The gift of Jesus Christ. I have learned that gifts also require sacrifice. In some cases making homemade gifts sacrifice precious time. Buying gift requires monetary sacrifice, getting a gift for a white elephant requires brain power to think of the gift. I find that at the end of the year especially in 2018 where Jman and I made a lot of decisions, struggled and cried more tears. That finding gifts, or making gifts seemed more like a chore instead of the joy it usually is.
I’ve often wondered if Mary, Jesus’s mother, were still alive today if Christmas would be have been hard for her. If Christmas was something she dreaded or rejoiced. She is someone I would love to sit down and drink tea and just ask her how did she have the faith to trust God so completely through her pregnancy and the birth of Jesus. What Sacrifices did she make? I would love to ask her “Mary were you ever afraid or doubtful?”
We can’t talk about Christmas without talking about the Sacrifice that God made. He lost his son. In a perfect world Parents and Children should get along, but more importantly, they are family. I’ve been taught that family Forgives regardless, loves unconditionally and stays loyal. I know most people don’t have that with their parents. I wonder what God thought of sending Jesus to earth. Knowing that he would have to be the world’s sacrifice to help break Satan’s power of the world. God is a just god, he is a righteous god but he is often described as a Father. The best father. The one who forgives easily and loves unconditionally. He runs and greets his children when they return from being lost. So I wonder if God felt sad. If God felt sad that he lost his son, his companion by just sending him to earth, He missed spending time with his son. God missed his spending time with his son.
Then finally Jesus. Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice and gave us the truest gift. He died for the world would be saved. That people with sin, strangers and people from different lands have the opportunity to join himself and God in the most wonderful world in place. He broke Satan’s hold on the fallen world. Christmas is about gifts but also about sacrifice.
Merry Christmas, God Bless you and Keep you and TTFN:)
Luke 1:46-55
The Magnificat: Mary’s Song of Praise
46 Mary responded,
“Oh, how my soul praises the Lord.
47 How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!
48 For he took notice of his lowly servant girl,
and from now on all generations will call me blessed.
49 For the Mighty One is holy,
and he has done great things for me.
50 He shows mercy from generation to generation
to all who fear him.
51 His mighty arm has done tremendous things!
He has scattered the proud and haughty ones.
52 He has brought down princes from their thrones
and exalted the humble.
53 He has filled the hungry with good things
and sent the rich away with empty hands.
54 He has helped his servant Israel
and remembered to be merciful.
55 For he made this promise to our ancestors,
to Abraham and his children forever.”
56 Mary stayed with Elizabeth about three months and then went back to her own home.
Danie with an E reflections 