In the past there was a time that my son would read the Bible every night before he went to sleep and I have realized, of late, that we both need to go back to this important habit. So over the past few weeks I have been reading the Bible to him at bedtime and it has been, to me, a transformational experience.
A week ago I read him the story of how Adam and Eve were tempted by the snake and the consequences of them being driven out of the garden. And I related to him that that is how sin began, and how we as human beings lost paradise, became slaves to sin, and bound under Satan’s power. I told him how Satan is always scheming to take as many human beings with him to hell. I narrated how the Devil was once an angel of light but because of pride he wanted to take God’s throne and rebelled against him and was in turn thrown down to earth with his hordes of fallen angels and have, since then, battled with God for the hearts and souls of men.
On another night we read from the book of Matthew about the birth of Jesus. The coming of Jesus was what God had planned all along to redeem us when our first parents fell. And that is why the angels sang and the whole of creation rejoiced at the coming of Jesus. They have been waiting for thousands of years for this revelation of God’s plan in the flesh in the form of Jesus Christ that first Christmas.
Growing up in church and listening to these stories repeatedly over the years had sadly jaded my heart and mind to these truths that there was no more wonder, nor awe nor utter gratitude as you would get from someone who’s listened to these stories or heard these truths for the very first time.
I found, however, that as I related these old truths to my son, they had become strangely new, piercing my heart and opening my mind to the broader picture of the universe and God’s will and purpose.
I do not know what it is that is different now. For years and years in my mind I knew. But lately, by some wonderful flash of spiritual light my heart understood. And last night I was so strangely overcome both by the love of God, and by the understanding of His grand and infinitely wise design in making us, and then, having fallen into sin-- in saving us.
Everything else will fall away. Nothing else matters except these truths…God made us. God loved us. We disobeyed. Satan triumphed. God’s heart was broken.
The story did not end there.
Still, God loved us. God made a plan. God sent Jesus to redeem us.
This is the whole point of Christmas, I told my son. God loved. God gave. We do not have to perish, if only we receive.
And since so freely you have received, freely give.
Merry Christmas!
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