I chose to write this the very moment that Christmas Eve turned
into Christmas Day.
While Christmas is always special, I feel especially blessed
this Christmas.
God continues to surround me with wonderful people who both love
me and encourage me.
Some of these people I see daily in the workplace.
Some I see weekly in the Sunday school class I teach and the
church in which I worship.
With the assistance of technology and social media I am
surrounded by still more.
Many of these people I will never be fortunate enough to meet
face to face in this world.
It is both comforting and amazing to think that I will be
able to do so in the next.
It is comforting in the sense that heaven is a reality in
which no one will be a stranger.
It is amazing in the sense this is only possible because of
the One whose birth we celebrate at this time of year.
This sense of amazement is multiplied when one really
contemplates the significance of that birth.
That is one of the things that truly separates Christianity
from all other religions.
Christianity is not about how a fallen man attempts to reach
up to God.
Christianity is about how God reached down to a fallen man
through Jesus Christ.
It is about how God planned for our salvation from the very beginning.
The Son of God had to be born into this fallen world.
He then had to live among us.
He had to be subjected to hunger, thirst and temptation.
He had to be subjected to ridicule and rejection.
He had to be subjected to abandonment, torture and, yes, even
death.
Yet never once did He sin.
Always, He forgave.
During His time among us, He taught us how to live.
He taught that it was important that we have a good
relationship with God.
He also emphasized that it was important for us to have a
good relationship with others.
In the coming days, we will take down all of the decorations
we put up for Christmas.
We will pack them into boxes and relegate them to attics and
storage rooms to lie all but forgotten for another year.
Please, let us not do that with Jesus.
Let us continue to celebrate all that He continues to be each
and every day of the year.
Let us do that as we reach out to a world that chooses to
live in darkness rather than step into His light.
Let us forge now the relationships that will last throughout
eternity.
John 3:17 (NET) – For God did not send His Son into the world to
condemn the world, but that the world should be saved through Him.
Blessings,
Jim Pokorny
The Other Brother Jim
Look for me at http://faithfulfeetteam.blogspot.com/ on
Friday, January 2, 2014.
I’ll be back here on Friday, January 9, 2014
