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The Christmas tree hunt is on!  The preferences are different, but the desire is the same.  We want the perfect Christmas tree!  You search for the right one.  You walk the rows.  You examine them from all angles.  This one is perfect!

God does the same.  He has picked you.  He knows just the place where you’ll be placed.  He has a barren living room in desperate need of warmth and joy.  A corner of the world needs some color.  He selected you with that place in mind.  God made you on purpose with a purpose.  He interwove calendar and character, circumstance and personality to create the right person for the right corner of the world, and then he paid the price to take you home. 1 Corinthians 6:20 says, “God bought you with a high price.”  The Christmas promise is this:  we have a Savior and his name is Jesus!

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A remarkable gift can arrive in an unremarkable package!  One did in Bethlehem.  We don’t often think of Paul in our Christmas reflections.  Yet we should.  His words in Philippians 2:5-11 are the Bible’s most eloquent summary of the Bethlehem promise.

“Who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God . . .rather he made himself nothing by taking the very form of a servant, being made in human likeness, and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross.

Therefore God called him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow. . .and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father!”

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Christmas is a season of interruptions.  Some we enjoy.  Some we don’t!  You may be facing an interruption during this season of life.  What you wanted and what you received do not match.  And now you’re troubled and anxious.  Everything inside you and every voice around you says, “Get out.  Get angry.”

But don’t listen to those voices.  You cannot face a crisis if you don’t face God first.  Colossians 1:16-17 says, “For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him.  He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment.”  God holds it all together.  And he will hold it together for you!

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If we could save ourselves—why would we need a Savior?  Jesus didn’t enter the world to help us save ourselves.  He entered the world to save us from ourselves.

As a Boy Scout, I earned a lifesaving merit badge.  The fact is, the only people I saved were other Boy Scouts who didn’t need to be saved.  During training I would rescue other trainees.  We took turns saving each other.  But since we weren’t really drowning, we resisted being rescued.  “Stop kicking and let me save you,” I’d say.

It’s impossible to save those who are trying to save themselves.  You might save yourself from a broken heart or going broke or running out of gas.  But you’re not good enough to save yourself from sin.  You are not strong enough to save yourself from death.  You need a Savior…and because of Bethlehem, you have one!

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Jesus not only did a work for us; he does a work in us!  Colossians 1:27 tells us, “The mystery in a nutshell is just this:  Christ is in you.”  He commands our hands and feet, requisitions our minds and tongues.  As Romans 8:29 declares,  “He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son.”

We’ll never be sinless, but we will sin less. And when we do sin, we have assurance that the grace that saved us also preserves us. We may lose our tempers, our perspective, and our self-control.  But we never lose our hope.  Scripture promises, “He is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy!”

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God has high plans for you and me.  He is recruiting for himself a people who will populate heaven.  It will be perfect.  Perfect in splendor.  Perfect in righteousness.  One word describes heaven:  perfect!  One word describes us:  imperfect!  So what does God do?  Abandon us?  Start over?  He could.  But he loves us too much to do that.

Will he populate heaven with rebellious, self-centered citizens?  If so, would heaven be heaven?  Colossians 1:19 says, “God was pleased for all of himself to live in Christ.”  All the love of God was in Jesus.  All the strength of God was in Jesus.  All the compassion and power and devotion of God were, for a time, in the earthly body of a carpenter. What started in the Bethlehem cradle culminated on the Jerusalem cross!  And God did it all to take us home to heaven.

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The sinful nature is the stubborn, self-centered attitude that says, “My way or the highway.” The sinful nature is all about self: pleasing self, promoting self, preserving self.  I have a sin nature!  So do you.  Under the right circumstances you will do the wrong thing.  You’ll try not to, but you will.  You have a sin nature.  You were born with it.

The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart! Christmas commemorates the day and the way God saved us from ourselves.  The angel speaking to Mary in Matthew 1:21 says, “. . .you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”  Each of us entered the world with a sin nature. God entered the world to take it away!

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Would you like to see God?  Take a look at Jesus!  Hebrews 1:3 says, “Jesus radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God.”  In John 14:9, Jesus himself said, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”  Anyone who has seen me weep has seen the Father weep.  Anyone who has seen me laugh as seen the Father laugh.  Anyone who has seen me determined has seen the Father determined.

Everything changes when we see the face of God.  He came with tears too.  He knows the burden of a broken heart.  He knows the sorrow life can bring.  He could have come as a shining light or a voice in the clouds, but he came as a person.  Does God understand you?  Look into God’s face and be assured.  Find the answer in Bethlehem.

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A friend of mine asked her students to make a list of questions, they would like to ask Mary. Here are some responses: “What was Jesus’ first word?” “Did he ever get sick?”  “Did Jesus ever misbehave?” They’re all legitimate questions.

The fact that we can ask them raises a greater one.  Why did God go so far?  Why did He become a human being?  A chief reason?  He wants you to know that he gets you. The Bible says in the book of Hebrews, He understands how you feel and has faced what you face.  Jesus has been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin!  (Hebrews 4:15-16).  So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give.  “Take the mercy, accept the help!” Because of Bethlehem, you can boldly go to him!

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If you want to see people on the edge of insanity, just watch the way families treat their babies at Christmastime!  The poor child has no warning!  Red furry stocking cap, goofy elfish shoes that curl at the toes.  And the pictures we take!  Baby snoozing under the tree.  Baby on Santa’s lap.  Santa with wet spot on lap.

Is not Christmas the story of a baby?  The moment that shaped all others?  Mary’s eyes falling on the face of her just-born son.  The first to whisper, “So this is what God looks like!” Never in mankind’s wildest imaginings did we consider that God would enter the world as an infant.  John 1:14 says, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”  Would you like to see God?   Take a look at the baby Jesus!

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No day is accidental or incidental.  No acts are random or wasted.  Look at Jesus’ birth at Bethlehem.  A king ordered a census.  Joseph was forced to travel.  Mary, as round as a ladybug, bounced on a donkey’s back.  The hotel was full.  The hour was late.  The event was one big hassle.

Yet out of the hassle, hope was born.  It still is.  I don’t like hassles.  But I love Christmas because it reminds us of the heart-shaping promises of Christmas.  Long after the guests have left, and the carolers have gone home and the lights have come down, these promises endure:  God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God (Romans 8:28).  Perhaps you could use some Christmas this Christmas?

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In Matthew 1:23, God called himself, “Immanuel”—which means, God with us!  Not just “God made us” or “God thinks about us.”  Not just “God above us.”  But God with us…God where we are.  He breathed our air and walked this earth. God. . .with. . .us!

Bethlehem was just the beginning.  Jesus has promised a repeat performance. Bethlehem, Act Two.  No silent night this time, however.  The skies will open, trumpets will blast, and a new kingdom will begin.  He will empty the tombs and melt the winter of death.  Death, you die!  Life, you reign!

The manger dares us to believe the best is yet to be.  I love Christmas because it reminds us how God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28).

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My dad, a man of few words, told my brother and me, “Boys, Christmas is about Jesus!”  In one of those bedtime, book-time moments, somewhere between the fairy tales and the monkey with the lunch pail, I thought about what he had said.  I began asking the Christmas questions.  And I’ve been asking them ever since!

God knows what it’s like to be a human.  When we talk to him about deadlines or tough times, he understands.  He’s been there.  He’s been here.  Because of Bethlehem, we have a friend in Jesus.  Christmas begins what Easter celebrates.  The child in the cradle became the King on the cross.  He doesn’t tell us, “Clean up before you come in.”  He offers, “Come in and I’ll clean you up.”  It’s not our grip on him that matters, but his grip on us!  And his grip is sure!

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Let the sleigh bells ring!  I love Christmas!  Let the carolers sing.  The more Santas the merrier.  I don’t complain about the crowded shops.  I don’t grumble at the jam-packed grocery store.  Well—it’s Christmas.

I love it because someone will ask the Christmas questions.  What’s the big deal about the baby in the manger?  Who was he?  What does his birth have to do with me?  The questioner may be a soldier stationed far from home.  She may be a young mom who, for the first time, holds a child on Christmas Eve.  The Christmas season prompts Christmas questions and answers.

Because of Bethlehem, God is always near us.  Always for us.  Always in us.  We may forget Him, but God will never forget us.  He called Himself “Immanuel”—God with us!

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Worry has more questions than answers, more work than energy, and thinks often about giving up. Not enough time…luck…credit…wisdom…intelligence…we’re running out of everything it seems, and so we worry.  But worry doesn’t work.  You can dedicate a decade of anxious thoughts to the brevity of life, and not extend it by one minute. Worry accomplishes nothing.

God doesn’t condemn legitimate concern for responsibilities but rather the continuous mind-set that dismisses God’s presence.  Destructive anxiety subtracts God from the future, tallies up the challenges of the day without entering God into the equation.  Jesus gives us this challenge:  “Your heavenly Father already knows all your needs.  Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need” (Matthew 6:32-33).

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We don’t like to talk about hell, do we?  In intellectual circles the topic of hell is regarded as primitive and foolish.  It’s not logical.  A loving God wouldn’t send people to hell.  So we dismiss it.

The doctrine of hell, however, is not one developed by Paul, Peter, or John.  It is taught primarily by Jesus himself.  And to dismiss it is to dismiss the presence of a loving God and the privilege of a free choice.  He leaves the choice to us.  He invites us to love him.  He urges us to love him.  He came that we might love him. To take that choice from each of us, for him to force us to love him, would be less than love.  God explains the benefits, outlines the promises, and articulates very clearly the consequences.  And then, in the end, he leaves the choice to us!

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The supreme surprise of God’s love?  It has nothing to do with you. Others love you because of you, because your dimples dip when you smile or your rhetoric charms when you flirt.  Some people love you because of you.  Not God.  He loves you because he is He.  He loves you because he decides to.  Self-generated, uncaused, and spontaneous, his constant-level love depends on his choice to give it.

Deuteronomy 7:7-8 says, “The LORD did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples.  But it was because the LORD loved you.” You don’t influence God’s love.  You can’t impact the tree-ness of a tree, the sky-ness of the sky or the rock-ness of a rock. Nor can you affect the love of God.

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Romans 8:32 says, “God did not keep back his own Son, but he gave him for us.  If God did this, won’t he freely give us everything else?”

Take your anxieties to the cross—literally. Next time you’re worried about your health or house or finances or flights, take a mental trip up the hill. Run your thumb over the tip of the spear.  Balance a spike in the palm of your hand.  Read the wooden sign written in your own language.  And as you do, touch the velvet dirt, moist with the blood of God. Blood he bled for you.  The spear he took for you.  The nails he felt for you.  The sign he left for you.  He did all of this—for you.  Knowing this, knowing all he did for you there, don’t you think he will look out for you here?

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God said, “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God.  In it you shall do no work; you, nor your son, nor your daughter” (Exodus 20:9-10).

God knows us so well.  He can see the store owner thinking, Somebody needs to work that day.  If I can’t, my son will.  So God says, “Nor your son.”  Then my daughter will, thinks the store owner. “Nor your daughter,” God has declared.  No, God says, one day of the week you will say no to work and yes to worship. You will slow down and sit down and lie down and rest.  Still we object.  We offer up one reason after another.  God’s message is plain.  If creation didn’t crash when I rested, it won’t crash when you do.  Repeat these words after me– It is not my job to run the world!

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Holiday travel.  It isn’t easy.  Then why do we do it?  Why cram the trunks and endure the airports?  You know the answer.  We love to be with the ones we love.  The four-year-old running up the sidewalk into the arms of Grandpa.  The cup of coffee with Mom before the rest of the house awakes.  That moment when, for a moment, everyone is quiet as we hold hands around the table and thank God for family and friends and pumpkin pie.  We love to be with the ones we love.

May I remind you?  So does God. How else do you explain what he did? Between him and us there was a distance—a great span.  And he couldn’t bear it.  He couldn’t stand it.  So he did something about it.  Philippians 2:7 reminds us, “He [Jesus] gave up his place with God and made himself nothing!”

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