It was below zero Christmas Eve night. Everyone in the family was on their way to the midnight candlelight service at the community church in observance of the birth of Christ. Everyone wanted to be there when the church bells rang out at midnight to bring in the Christmas morning.
Everyone that is, except Nicholas, the husband and father of the family. He believed in God all right, but he couldn’t quite grasp the Christian belief that God actually visited this planet by becoming a man in the person of Jesus Christ and then died on a cross to take away our sins. Why would God, the creator of this universe, want to become like one of us. To Nicholas, that made absolutely no sense.
While waiting for his family to return from church to open their Christmas gifts – a family tradition – Nicholas sat by the fireplace in the family room reading a book. All of a sudden he hears a loud thump against a large glass window pane in the family room. He looks out the window and saw a bird badly injured. The bird probably saw the light of the fire and wanted to get in out of the cold.
Concerned for its welfare, Nicholas went outside to try and help the bird find shelter from the cold until it could recover. When the bird saw him approaching, it scurried as best it could under a bush. Nicholas tried everything to help, but the bird was scared and he couldn’t get to it.
He put some bird seed out, hoping to lure the bird from under the bush. He even tried talking to the bird, and also thought if only the bird could read; he would try to spell it out on paper so that the bird could see that he was only trying to save its life.
Finally, Nicholas thought to himself, if only I could become like a bird I could communicate and show that I only wanted to save its life. At that precise moment of time the bells at the community church rang out in celebration of the birth of Christ. It was Christmas morning.
Suddenly, Nicholas had an awakening. For the first time, he saw clearly what his family had been trying to tell him about Jesus. At last he understood how God had tried to talk to us, but we wouldn’t listen. He wrote to us, but we refused to read. So out of sheer unconditional love, Jesus Christ, God Himself stepped out of heaven and took on a body of human flesh. Thirty-three years later Jesus died on the cross to take away the sins of the world. The Bible teaches “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus.” (Rom 6:23)
LIFE LESSON: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have ETERNAL LIFE.”
THE GREATEST GIFT…EVER!
Thanks be to God for His indescribable Christmas gift, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior!
Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth, peace and goodwill towards men.
Thank you for your prayers, partnership, and financial support. They are a great encouragement to us. You’re the best…
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
From all of us at Growing in Grace Ministries