Christmas Love

A young woman walked into the editorial offices of a magazine, asking to speak to an editor. When granted an appointment, she identified herself as a poet interested in getting her poems published.

“What are your poems about?” the editor asked.

“Oh, they’re all about love,” she responded.

“And what does love mean to you?”

“Oh, love is that feeling you have when you’re with someone special on a moonlit night, with moonbeams shimmering on the surface of the lake, and your heart nearly pounds out of your chest, and...”

“No, no, no!” interrupted the editor. “Love is filling hot water bottles at 2 am and caring for ailing children. Don’t talk to me about your shimmering moonbeams. Come back when life experience has taught you about real love.”

A bit abrupt on the editor’s part, perhaps, but nevertheless a dose of reality.

If some fiction writers had penned the Christmas story, they may have had Jesus born in a palace, attended by servants, and laid on soft pillows. Instead, the reality of how love came down at Christmas includes childbirth in a stable, where Mary was attended, as far as we know, only by Joseph. When the Christ Child entered the world, He was placed in a manger, a trough that held animals’ food. You can be sure the stable’s dirt and smells were typical of a place occupied by animals.

Yet, we must not mistake the rough surroundings as an indication of a deficiency in love. The fact is that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16, NIV®).

The Amplified Bible’s rendering offers some extra dimensions of that love:  For God so [greatly] loved and dearly prized the world, that He [even] gave His [One and] only begotten Son, so that whoever believes and trusts in Him [as Savior] shall not perish, but have eternal life.

“Great loved and dearly prized.” We can miss the significance of that if we only think of the world as a giant sphere with 7 billion inhabitants. Substitute your own name: “God so greatly loved and dearly prized” Jane or Bill or Frank or whomever. He greatly loves and dearly prizes you.

You mean He loves me even after what I’ve done? After what I’ve said? After what I’ve thought? Yes, even after all that.

Nothing you have done or said or thought is so bad that it would make Him stop loving you. Yet, allow this thought to drill into your consciousness: He loves you so much He doesn’t want you to stay that way.