To many people, teachings of a virgin birth, a star, angels appearing unto shepherds, and a Savior being born may sound odd. It would be like cracking open a book for the first time and starting to read in the middle. You don't know any of the characters, the setting, the purpose, the conflict; you just pick up in the middle of the story. This year, in my preaching and personal study, I've been setting the Christmas story in its larger Gospel narrative story. The Gospel narrative follows these major checkpoints: Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Restoration.
With Creation, we find the roots of Christmas. We find God's original plan - the Edenic perfection that God will one day restore. "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." (Gen. 1:1) The Bible declares this. "All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made." (John 1:3) This is a fact that we must accept by faith. Adopting a biblical worldview with God as Creator places Him in charge. He sets the rules. We are the created. We receive our existence from Him. The purpose of our existence is inseparably wrapped up in His will. "It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves." (Psalm 100:3) Our departure from this realization created the need for Christmas. I find it interesting that, as intelligent people, we ordinarily have no trouble inferring creative activity over against a hodgepodge of disorganized messes. For example, if I show you a fully wrapped gift that is placed under my Christmas tree, you naturally infer that someone wrapped the gift. If I place a tape dispenser, a pair of scissors, a roll of wrapping paper, and the gift on a table, how long would I need to wait for the gift to be wrapped? Years? Centuries? Millions of Years? Will it ever happen? Apart from the origins of the universe, we never apply the same assumptions about origins. And yet the universe is (obviously) far more complex than any of these other things that require agency to come together. Not to mention - wouldn't someone have to create the first matter from which all else evolved? The story of Christmas - of God sending His Son to be the Savior of fallen mankind - can never make complete sense to people who reject the idea of creation. God created the world. He created you and me. He loves us and desires fellowship with us. The events of Christmas occurred to move us along this overall trajectory - of bringing us full circle back to the perfection God had created.
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