Nativity of Our Lord - Christmas Eve
Titus 2:11-14 (NRSV)
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, training us to renounce impiety and worldly passions, and in the present age to live lives that are self-controlled, upright, and godly, while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. He it is who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds.
Reflection
Wow! What a horrible year this has been for me. I suffered from Crohn's flares multiple times this past year. On top of that, one of the side effects are kidney stones. Well, I had em! After multiple tests and bunches of glamour pictures of my innards the doctors went after those stones. Two lithotripsy treatments didn't work. One of those treatments involved the installation of a stent. Several months of infections with high fevers. Finally the doctor decided to go in through my back and remove the stones from my kidney. What a terrible year!
And on top of all that my Mom died on my birthday and my Father-in-law died a couple of months later. Family stress and upheaval over these deaths followed by my Mother-in-law going into a nursing home. My daughter suffers from the effects of mental illness, my wife coming apart at the seams and I was missing more work than what anyone would care to miss in an environment of high unemployment and fiscal disaster.
Then think of all the events going on in the world. We had the Aurora shooting and the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting. A presidential election that was ugly and calls and calls and calls to my home phone. The super storm Sandy hitting the people of New York City and surrounding areas. Conflict in Libya and the scandal at Penn State. How about the Fiscal Cliff? Then what's happening in Syria. The list goes on and on and on. Tornadoes and fires and the end of the world scare from the Mayan calendar.
What is this world coming to?
Wait a minute! It's not about what this world is coming to. It's rather about what has come to this world. It's not about my poor old self and what I've suffered through. It's what has come to me to be with me while I suffered. It's not about the events of this world and the tragedy of it all. It's what's come to us in the midst of pain and suffering. What's? Rather who!
God came into this world at the precise time planned. God came into this world as a baby in a manger. God came into this world, humble and poor. God came into this world and suffered, laughed, endured and lived to die for you and me. God came into this world as Jesus just when Jesus needed to come into this world. And God still comes into this world to live and suffer and die with each one of us and all of us together.
Jesus felt all of the pain and the suffering and the living and the dying that all of us feel. Jesus even cried and mourned and laughed and lived as you and I live each day. Sure, I got sick this year, sure I had people I loved die this year. Sure, I had to support and live with those near and dear to me that are living with illness, sickness, sadness and pain this year.
God not only comes into the world in Jesus, but he has comes into my life to live with me through all of the ups and downs. Jesus and the Holy Spirit descended into my world upon my baptism. I was washed over with God and buried under the waters of baptism so that I could realize what God had done for me. I live a life in sin, yet free of sin because of Jesus coming into this world and doing what he has done for all people.
Do you believe it? Do you accept what God has done for you? God has done this for all people. A Gift given freely. Accept the gift. Live into the freedom of the gift. Respond to the gift and live a life through the tragic impact of sin, death, disease, destruction and tragedy. Live a life of hope and anticipation for the time when God comes to you and calls you and uses you. It may be a momentary call or a call to a career. But it's a call and God will give you all you need to respond to that wonderful call.
See, how God gave himself to us, in Jesus and the Holy Spirit. God comes to us! God lives with us and in us and through us and teaches us and strengthens us and gives us no choice but to believe. God is with us! God gave himself to us to redeem us and to make us clean for him. We have a comforter with us always. Even when the event hurts so bad we can't stand it, Jesus comes to us to comfort us and give us hope. We are God's people!
In that perfect time God will come again. Jesus will return for us in this world in which we live. The tragedy and the tears and the illness will be gone. In God's time this will happen. But until that time, we look to in hope, we will live under God and live with the assurance of a Savior that lived in this very same world in which we live in. A time of hope and joy and salvation. Here and now and to come.
It's not what has happened to the world in which we live. It's not, "What has this world come to."
It's "What... or Who has come to this world."
"For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, training us to renounce impiety and worldly passions, and in the present age to live lives that are self-controlled, upright, and godly, while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. He it is who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds."
Thanks be to God!
Prayer
Thank you Jesus! Come, Lord Jesus, come... today... tomorrow... and forever. --- Amen
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