I love Christmas! Sure I love spending time with family, baking cookies with my mom, watching Irving Berlin's White Christmas, wrapping presents, singing Christmas carols, etc., but what I really love is the time for reflecting on the birth of Christ. Tonight though I’ve been thinking a lot about what our world would be like if Christ had NOT been born. I have been aided in these thoughts by a letter from Sam Crabtree to the congregation at Bethlehem Baptist (Piper’s church). It's entitled, "What Would Not Be If Jesus Had Not Been" available at desiringgod.org. [Sorry I'm not linking directly to it, I'm having problems tonight inserting links.]
If Christ had not come to earth, lived a perfect life, died on the cross for my sins, rose victoriously from the grave, triumphing over death...I would not be able to come before our most holy God, I wouldn’t have the Holy Spirit to rely on day in and day out, I would not have a church family, I would not have the wonderful encouraging missionary biographies to read, the apostle Paul who is such a great inspiration to me would never have penned the epistles. There would be no verses that serve as my lifelines, like…
“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” -Colossians 3:1-4
Or Philippians 3:7-10, “But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.”
Or verses that send waves of excitement through me and cause me to want to burst out singing at the top of my lungs…
“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” –Ephesians 2:4-10
Ultimately, if Christ had not come to this earth, I would have no hope of heaven. Such sobering thoughts on Christmas Eve, but oh how they make me love and adore my Lord all the more! Because the truth of the matter is He DID come to earth, He DID live a perfect life, He DID die on the cross and was resurrected and I am now clothed in His perfect righteousness and have full access to a perfect, holy God through Christ alone. Oh how I love this!!!
Sam Crabtree says at the beginning of his letter “I pray that during this Christmas season and at all times God would enable you to treasure his incarnate and risen son above all else.” And I must thank this man, although I don’t know him, because his letter posted on Desiring God, has done just that for me. Oh how I love my Lord more tonight, thinking of what my life would look like if He had never come. It causes me to celebrate His birth with a more joyful and grateful heart than I have ever before!!!
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