The wonder of Christmas

The wonder of Christmas

Flash mob = a large group of people organized through e-mail or electronic bulletin board who perform randomly in a public space and then disperse.

One of my favorites is a group performing Handel’s hallelujah chorus in a mall in America, it has been an internet sensation.

I love it, your going about your normal day, your normal routine, eating, working, trying to get some place, and something out of the ordinary breaks up your routine that leaves you at first startled, and bewildered, but then you see it, and its glorious, and wonderful and clever, and majestic, and leaves you smiling for the rest of the day and stays in your imagination for the rest of your life.

The story of Christmas, of God becoming human flesh and being born in a manger in an obscure village called Bethlehem, in an obscure nation, Israel. Is like a divine flash mob. Seemingly random, but amazingly orchestrated, there’s angels, and lighting effects in the skies, and there’s, shepherds, and wise men and all sorts. And when you read the story and when you see this divine extraordinary moment breaking through into our ordinary human existence, your left with a sense of wonder and awe.

 I want us to  wonder again with the story of Christmas, sometimes we can be overly familiar with it,  like  a Christmas present, that new toy or C.D. we get and we become enamored with it at first but after playing with it or listening to it a few times we get bored and we become indifferent to it.

Isaiah 9:6

For to us a child is born,

To us a son is given,

And the government will be on his shoulders

And He will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

This is a piece of scripture that shows the wonder of God breaking into our world,

‘A child is born’ – speaks of Jesus humanity, we talked about that in my last blog, God becoming flesh and dwelling among us as fully human, and all that means.

‘To us a son is given’ – speaks of Jesus being divine. Fully man yet fully God. Creator of the heavens and the earth, co-equal with God the Father and the Spirit, and Co-eternal, having no beginning and no end,

‘And the government will be on his shoulders’ – Leadership can at times be a burden. You got to make tough decisions, be engaged in the present yet keep an eye on the future, to keep a wide view but also dip into the detail, those of you who are managers, supervisors bosses know what I mean.

You got to keep an eye on sales and marketing, the product, the service, the delivery, the H.R., customer s, stake holders etc. When your employees go home they can rest but your mind keeps working.  You as a leader you shoulder responsibility, you shoulder burden.  Here we see the glory of Christmas – God comes to earth as divine yet also fully human and he shoulders responsibility he takes the burden of the worlds problems on himself.

We look at the world and we see the government of the world struggle to come up with solutions to the world’s problems. We see it with recession, and global debt, we see it in the growing gap between the haves and have not’s, we see it in global warming and environmental issues.

We see that the world’s government struggles to get headway in the issues of the day. We all long for a better day, for a better way. We long to see the poor set free from the pain of crippling debt, we long to see the end of ethnic violence, and terrorism. We long to see the end of environmental disasters, we long to see war coming to an end. We long to see an end to broken nations and broken people and a broken world.

The wonder of Christmas the greatness of Christmas, is that God has put on human flesh, put on his work clothes, and has started through His son Jesus to put the world back right again. He’s shouldering the responsibility of government in the world, restoring things back to Himself. God’s purpose as it says in Eph 1:10 is “to bring all things together in heaven and earth together under one head, even Christ.’”

This is the good news of Christmas, God is at work, in the world, it takes faith to see it, but its there. And for those who believe those who trust, those who hand over control, He can take their burden as well.   He longs to take the burden of our own sin, our failings and wrong doings, our addictions, and brokenness, our prejudices and fears and insecurities. The story of Christmas is not just for the world but for us.

This Christmas lets embrace the wonder afresh, lets put our trust in God who became man and dwelt among us, a God who cared enough to embrace all that it means to be human and who died a horrible death on the cross for the sake of our sin and the decay of the world, a God who conquered sin, rising from the dead and whose government is placed upon His shoulder putting the world to right, and whom one day will put the world fully to right.

Merry Christmas - Graeme