December 16, 2002
CHRISTMAS WISH:
Let Christmas come again this year
___The Child of Christmas Morning did not force his way into the stable at Bethlehem any more than love left heaven when he came. Hope's coming was a matter of divine timing purposefully affixed into salvation's plan. Christmas was born in the heart of
God before the world was, "before the morning stars sang together." Christmas is the Almighty's caring gift of loving incentive, heaven's offering of soul's competency and Earth's enigma of grace personified. Christmas is the Word becoming flesh, thereby providing spiritual opportunity for all mankind to know life everlasting--world without end.
___Christmas will not come uninvited. The aftermath of caroling angels is having a new song to sing. That's what Christmas is about! It is a personal and universal invitation to join in chorus with believers everywhere in singing the sweet, sweet song of salvation--the one song we must be motivated to sing by the quickening of the spirit.
___Surely it is understandable that we invite Christmas to come. We cannot make it come!
___Let it come with unfeigned faith, unrestrained joy, unsilenced praise. Let it come to the poor and the rich, the schooled and the unschooled, the imprisoned and the free, the strong and the weak, the depressed and the discouraged, the churched and the unchurched. Let us joy in its coming in its own way, manifest by its own prerogative, fashioned invitingly, unobtrusively, warm and kindly. Let Christmas come to all who will heartily welcome its coming. It was as always intended to come that way, was it not? A glorious festival of faith!
___Now may the God of Christmas nearing forgive our flair for awkward demonstration, equations overdrawn; and may the Spirit of Christmas be forthcoming, O Gentle Peacebringer. Let it come to our frightened, pain-torn world whose only lasting hope still remains the Victor of the Cross--the conqueror of death, hell and the grave.
___Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
___BO Baker, a longtime Texas Baptist pastor and evangelist, has written a Christmas reflection for the Baptist Standard for 27 years
The Baptist Standard
News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.
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