Our powerful and awesome Lord, hollowed be your name. We are so blessed to be given the gift of your son, for we did not choose it ourselves, but you graciously chose us to be given it. Why have you chosen us who have received? I do not know, but I am ever so grateful that you have made such a joyous decision. We love you Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for the grace you have bestowed on us and the way you are working us to change us and make us more like Jesus every day. Continue this work in us until the day we die. In Jesus name, Amen.
The truth is that I love Christmas, not because it's a celebration of the death of Jesus, but because I get to receive gifts from my family. Our culture today focuses on how much you can get out of people. I know that I have often fallen into this sort of mind-set. For Christmas, I make sure everyone knows what I want so that I don't end up with anything I don't want. I usually make a list of things I want so that people will know what to get me, it's barely a surprise anymore. Do not be consumed, my friends, by the stuff of this world, for it is all going to pass away. I admit that, at times, I struggle with just wanting people to focus on me and give me more stuff, but do not be like this, this is not of God.
I told you that our culture is focused on telling everyone to try and get all you can in this life, after all, they say, you only have one life. The Bible teaches the opposite however. The Bible teaches that it is better to give than to receive. We are told by the Scriptures that it is better to lose than to get. Our culture says it is better to get everything you can because you only have one life, the Bible says it is better to give everything you have because you will receive everything in the next life. The Bible teaches that we have received the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, what greater gift is there than this?
God wants us to give to others because we have been graciously given to by him. When we sacrifice something small and see the difficulty in doing so, we can better understand what Jesus had to give up for us. God wants us to understand what he gave up for us, along with be united and encouraging as the body of Christ. The best way to ruin any kind of relationship is to take everything you can from that person, such as energy and time. The person will quickly get worn out and want nothing to do with the person who is taking so much from them. The way to maintain a relationship is for both people to be giving what they have to the other person in that relationship because than everything that is being given away by either person is being restored by the other person in the relationship. This is the way God meant for community to be. This is the way God wanted him to give to us and us to give to him. He gave us Jesus, we should give him ourselves, for this is the reasonable response.
God calls his children to be generous as he has been generous. The best way to lead is by example, and God has done that for his children by giving us Jesus. Let us follow that example is humility and praise of what the great Father has graciously bestowed upon us. Give before you receive, but receive what is given to you. This is a Christians declaration of the trust in God that there is another life to come, and that this life is not all there is.
"It is more blessed to give than to receive." Acts 20:35
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