Merry Christmas!
I tend to go about things backwards from time to time. For instance, you would think that if you have a big idea, you use eloquence to express that big idea. That would be the forward way of going about writing. Once in a while, though, in doing my writing, I'll stumble on a big idea because I'm trying to be eloquent.
I did that the other day, writing my latest Weekly Reminder. In pondering what Christmas really means to believers worldwide, I said, "But the peace they know is eternal, a peace between God and man, the limitless void between sin and holiness bridged by a bloodstained cross."
And I have been thinking about that ever since. It's not that I haven't thought about the incarnation before; it's that I never tried to compare it to human suffering.
We cannot understand the incarnation because we have never known perfection. Even those of us living in the most free nation on earth have never come close–we live in a fallen world, surrounded by fallen people, always seeing evidence of the sin nature that enfolds us. The closest that I have come experiencing the incarnation is in traveling from the U.S. to the third world. It's a poor example, but it is the essence of the matter. Going from freedom, comfort, and convenience to oppression and poverty is a tiny picture of going from Heaven to earth.
That Christ was willing to cross that incomprehensible gap is the essence of Christmas. But it doesn't end there…
If Christmas were just about Christ bridging the earth/Heaven gap, it would ring hollow. It would be a miracle without a meaning. But this sacrifice is the source of salvation, in bridging the second gap, the gap between sin and holiness.
That is the void mankind faces. It is the void we cannot cross. It is the insurmountable gap that we must attempt to jump anyway, facing certain doom as we fall short of even seeing our target.
That gap, bridged by the bloodstained cross of a Christ who came from Heaven to earth, is why I celebrate this year.
Merry Christmas!