It is inescapable during the advent/Christmas season to think about Jesus being born a little baby and being laid in a manger. But for a moment I’d like to zoom out and discuss the broader subject of Jesus. He was prophesied to come, be born to a virgin, in Bethlehem, etc. He is the incarnation, or the putting into flesh the existence of God. He didn’t just come only to die for His creation. He actually was here for 33 years and in that time he modeled for us how to live! He shared so much in such a short time period, people have devoted lifetimes to studying His life and still it has surprises and mysteries.

God is not up in heaven with lightning bolts in His hands ready to smite us lowly sinners down here. In fact, the most recent analogy I heard about the wrath of God is this, that when you get close to a fire and it burns you, you don’t think to yourself that the fire attacked you. Instead you realize that the very nature of a fire is its heat, and if you get too close, you’ll get burned. God’s wrath is like that. He is pure holiness, and our sin makes us unholy. So if we have sin (which we all do) we are all unholy. And since God cannot be in the presence of sin, His holiness literally consumes all sin and sin carriers. But Jesus, yes little baby Jesus, who grew up, showed us how to live, how to love and how to sacrifice our lives, by sacrificing Himself. His death paid the price for our sins. Remember that Holy wrath I spoke of a moment ago, well when we place our faith in Jesus, God no longer sees us and our sins, He sees His son Jesus and pure holiness.

And now we come to the resurrection. This is where Jesus’s physical body came out of the grave and after a number of days ascended to Heaven. And through the faith and relationship with Jesus we too have been promised to be able to be in God’s presence in our resurrected bodies as well…forever. So, the birth of Jesus is the beginning of the great plan that God put into motion to give us a way back into communion and relationship with Him forever.

To start at the beginning of this Advent/Christmas series, click here

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