Before all the Christmas elves get mad, I begin by saying the celebration of the Savior’s birth is a joy and delight to me and my family. Even the American Christmas culture, though much of it misses the whole point of the holiday, is delightful in many ways. Music, decorations, special foods - these are all so very good.
But if we want to climb to the pinnacle of high holy days as Christians, we will reverently bear ourselves over the incline of the incarnation to the mighty heights of Good Friday and Easter Sunday. It is here where the birth of Christ finds its fulfillment - the very reason for the manger in Bethlehem.
Perhaps we’ve prettied up Christmas too much. In reality, a poor, young frightened couple are in a terrible fix, with labor pains coming and not a bed to be found. God providentially provides an animal’s shelter. This is not a clean, sanitary, comfortable place. Silent Night is not playing in the background. There is no hospital, doctor or even midwife available. And if you’ve experienced birth, you know it’s messy, difficult business in the best of conditions. This is the glorious palace into which our God descended as a fully human baby boy.
He grew up, and walked this earth, and the loveliness of His ways and His character could not be contained if every book in the world and every inch of the internet were engaged for that task. Yet His purpose was not primarily to teach and heal and show the way, but to die.
Good Friday is the holiday that provides the richest gift to the poorest beggar. The good news Jesus came to tell, He then demonstrated when He willingly gave up His brilliant, perfect life for the likes of us. To be the One to take on himself the penalty for our sin. Heaven thundered and roared and the sky darkened in the middle of the day when the Savior of the world offered up the gift so great the whole world can’t contain it. It is wrapped in the red blood of Christ, and sparkles with the gold of redemption for every soul that simply believes, from the beginning of time to the end.
Good Friday is better than Christmas.
In the treasure of the gift of Christ, we find not a lifeless salvation. If Jesus is dead, Christianity is just another religion, with a great teacher-prophet, who is not mighty to save. As the bible declares through the pen of the Apostle Paul:
“And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins”. ~ 1 Cor. 15:17
But Christ is indeed raised. And by many historical evidences, as Pastor Tim Keller says:
“The resurrection of Christ is both intellectually credible and existentially satisfying.”
And so, this magnificent present of the atoning death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is teeming with life. The box, so to speak, is alive and bursting to be opened. God’s Easter gift is freely given to all who will come to the tree on which Jesus died, and the tomb from which He emerged to devastate death and hell - and believe.
Easter is better than Christmas.
Have a very merry Easter.
Your friend on the pilgrim road,
Loriann
