What is the best Christmas gift you’ve ever received? Questions like that make our minds retreat to childhood, when we poked and rattled wrapped packages away from the watchful eyes of mom or dad. I think it’s interesting that I can remember many of those childhood gifts but not remember some of the gifts I’ve received as an adult. There’s aura of mystery around Christmas that embeds those memories on our young minds.
I remember getting a hot wheels race track one year. With joy I snapped those yellow plastic sections of track together and clamped the end to the kitchen counter. With delight I raced those cars down the track into the family room, barely hearing my father’s admonition to keep the cars picked up so that no one would step on one and “break their neck.”
Another year I got G.I. Joe’s. And yet another one of those electric football games complete with the plastic players that ran circles on thin sheet metal. Those memories are ever present in my mind.
My present sermon series is titled Regifting Christmas. It’s meant to be an Advent take on the most famous verse in the Bible, John 3:16. The Bible proclaims that “God loved the world (the object of his love) so much that he gave (love implies action) his one and only Son (the gift)…”
Every gift reveals something about the giver of the gift. What does the gift of Jesus reveal about God? I think it tells us that God is loving. He’s generous and extravagant. He’s thoughtful and aware of our needs. When God gave Jesus he took the initiative and gave first. He didn’t give as a response to anything we have given or done. And God certainly gave the best and the most. When we think of Jesus, we realize that the gift is extravagant. And the gift is extravagant to awaken our faith.
What do you think the gift of Jesus reveals to you about God?
I remember getting a hot wheels race track one year. With joy I snapped those yellow plastic sections of track together and clamped the end to the kitchen counter. With delight I raced those cars down the track into the family room, barely hearing my father’s admonition to keep the cars picked up so that no one would step on one and “break their neck.”
Another year I got G.I. Joe’s. And yet another one of those electric football games complete with the plastic players that ran circles on thin sheet metal. Those memories are ever present in my mind.
My present sermon series is titled Regifting Christmas. It’s meant to be an Advent take on the most famous verse in the Bible, John 3:16. The Bible proclaims that “God loved the world (the object of his love) so much that he gave (love implies action) his one and only Son (the gift)…”
Every gift reveals something about the giver of the gift. What does the gift of Jesus reveal about God? I think it tells us that God is loving. He’s generous and extravagant. He’s thoughtful and aware of our needs. When God gave Jesus he took the initiative and gave first. He didn’t give as a response to anything we have given or done. And God certainly gave the best and the most. When we think of Jesus, we realize that the gift is extravagant. And the gift is extravagant to awaken our faith.
What do you think the gift of Jesus reveals to you about God?
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