Merry Christmas! It’s finally here, the day we celebrate the birth of a little baby in the tiny village of Bethlehem all those years ago.
Every December, I sit down and watch all of the old Christmas TV specials I watched as a kid. You know, shows like “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” and “The Year Without a Santa Claus.” I mean, who can forget the Heat Miser and the Snow Miser? It’s okay that you’re laughing at me; I can take it.
I was watching “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” this week, and the narrator, voiced by Fred Astaire, begins to explain why Kris Kringle chose December 25th as the one night each year when he would deliver presents. Kris decided to distribute gifts on “the holiest night of the year, the night of profound love.”
Christmas is indeed a time to celebrate the profound love of God.
Sometimes our beliefs about God, though, hinder our ability to see his love. We might see God as a heavenly Ebenezer Scrooge, looking down on us just waiting to say, “Stop that! You’re having too much fun! Bah, humbug!”
Sure, the Bible teaches us that God is perfectly just and fair. He has rules, and rebellion against those rules must be punished. God is perfectly just, so the penalty for our disobedience must be paid.
But God is also perfect love. God is love. The Apostle John couldn’t have said it any better…
God is love. (1 John 4:8b)
If we had to narrow God down to one single characteristic, it would be love.
We can best comprehend the greatness of God’s love in light of his perfect justice. Our sin has separated us from God forever. That’s God’s justice. But God wants us to be restored to him, to be made right with him. The Bible word for being made right with God is “justification.” In God’s justice, our sin cannot go unpunished. But God loves us and wants us to be “justified,” to be made right with him.
So God provided the only way for his justice and his love to be reconciled. He gave his Son to pay the penalty that we deserve to pay for our disobedience. That makes God both the just and the justifier.
It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:26)
Our just God made sure that the penalty was paid, and then he paid the penalty himself. In God’s perfect justice, our sin had to be punished. In God’s perfect love, he took the punishment. Only when you understand God’s justice can you truly appreciate his love, a love so profound that God did what he had to so that we could have a relationship with him.
This is what we celebrate at Christmas. That baby lying in a manger was fully human and fully God. He’s our Savior, the Christ, the Messiah. He’s the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He’s the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. He’s the Almighty, the Author and Perfector of our faith, the Bread of Life, the Good Shepherd, Emmanuel, the Light of the World, the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He’s the Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. He is Christ the Lord.
That little baby grew up and died on a cross to pay the penalty that each of us deserves to pay. That’s how much God loves you. I pray that in the middle of all the hustle and bustle, and the giving and receiving of presents, and the decorations, and the Red Ryder BB guns, and the Charlie Brown Christmas trees — that you’ll take the time this Christmas to ponder and reflect on and truly appreciate the profound love that your Savior has for you.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)