High Expectations for Christmas

The most common question asked this time of year has got to be, "What do you want for Christmas?"  We adults were asked it as children, and we, in turn, ask this of other little children, and so on... An innocent question?  I THINK NOT!!! (insert dramatic music here)

Beneath this question lurks an underlying "gimme" attitude about life, and when it's attached to Christmas, all manner of faith-related problems begin to surface.  Jesus becomes, for all too many, a sort of "Genie Jesus" - - a granter of wishes, a source of happiness, a fulfiller of life's inner longings.  Well, Jesus was never in a bottle (that we know of), and he isn't here to coddle us into lives of faith.  Don't get me wrong... The Christian life is tremendously fulfilling, but it comes as a RESULT of following Jesus.  If our goal is  self-fulfillment, we're lost and on our own.  If service to God and others is our response to God's love in Christ, following Jesus' example of giving himself as a servant to all, only then will we find real fulfillment and peace.  The rest won't matter.

God’s Richest Blessings as You Celebrate Jesus’ Birth!

Pastor Larry Becker