Our Greatest Christmas Gift: God, the Son

Our Greatest Christmas Gift: God, the Son

by

Ula Gillion

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For to us a child is born, to us a son is given…And he will be called…Mighty God, Everlasting Father (Isaiah 9 portions of verse 6).

The above verse leaves little doubt that Jesus is God with us (Immanuel). No one else can be called Everlasting Father and Mighty God. There is only one God and He revealed Himself as God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.

Now, if Jesus is the Mighty God, why did He come as a Son? There are many reasons, but I would like to touch on one: How he related to His Father as the Son. I believe that not only did He come to show us what the ultimate Father-Child relationship looks like, but also to show how we can have such a personal relationship with the Father. After all, He did say: “I Am the Way…no one comes to the Father except by me.” (John 14:6).

With His entire life He showed us the way to the Father. When we look at His relationship with His Father, we will find there are many lessons for our interpersonal relationships too.

From His example we see that:

1. He treasured the presence of His Father because He loved Him. Prayer was not a burden to Him. He made time to be alone with His Father. “Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed…” Our love for God should make prayer something we desire to do and not something we feel we must do.
2. He never acted or spoke apart from His Father. He had complete trust in His Father. He also fully entrusted every new day to His Father. He may have had plans of going here or there but often He was distracted because of the immediate needs of people which came across His path. He would then stop to help them and continue from there. Because He fully trusted God to be in charge of every day, He never got irritated with people “bugging” Him with their needs. He didn’t feel pressed to be at a certain place at a certain time, and for that reason He could help whoever came across His path. He trusted God to work things out. “The just shall live by faith…” every single day. Can we trust God enough to work out every day for us, or is it still important that we “take charge?” Life is a lot less stressful if we can live every day knowing that our Sovereign God is in full control. Sure, we have schedules. Planning is important, but when we live by faith we don’t freak out when things don’t turn out the way we planned.
3. He openly spoke to His Father about everything –joy, pain, delight, and He prayed for others too. We can tell our Father everything –He knows it all anyway J
4. He had a spontaneous relationship with His Father. He made time to be alone with God but there were also times when He started praising God in the presence of His friends. There was nothing rigid or forced about His communication with His Father. It would be quite ridiculous if we had to speak to our earthly fathers in same way in which we pray sometimes. Imagine we speak to our dads only at a specific time each day and only for a predetermined period of time. We also adopt a different accent and suddenly sound like we were born in the King James era. Pretty ridiculous right? Jesus showed us the way to have spontaneous communication with God as much as He set the example for setting aside time for God.
5. No matter how busy we get doing all those good deeds, we should never neglect to make time for those we cherish. We can easily get carried off with the tide of success and neglect our relationships. Sadly, many people discover too late in their lives that it was never about things, but all about people. A relationship is a living, breathing creation that needs to be constantly nurtured and one of the most important ways to keep a relationship strong is to make time for each other. Time with friends and time alone.
6. Like Jesus always considered the name of His Father before doing anything, so we too can keep our relationships strong by always remembering that whatever we do will affect not only ourselves, but also the other people in the relationship –whether it is our family, children or partners in life. Respect for each other is essential for a strong and healthy relationship.
7. Keeping secrets from each other is disastrous for a close relationship. We have to be open with each other as Jesus was with His Father. Yes, it isn’t possible to hide things from God and it is possible to hide things from people in our lives, but that is even more reason to be open since they trust us to be honest with them.
8. Just as it is important to make time for each other, we shouldn’t forget that not everything we do together has to be pre-planned. It is important to have structure but we should always leave room for those spontaneous moments where we just savour the moment and enjoy those unexpected special times together.

Lessons from Jesus for Our Relationships:

In so many uncountable ways, Jesus Christ is the most precious Gift to humanity and we can never have enough words to thank our Father for the precious gift of our Lord. But even though we may lack enough words, this doesn’t stop us from thanking God and showing that thankfulness with the way we relate to Him and to others.

And with these thoughts I wish everyone a most wonderful, peaceful and joyful Christmas Celebration in the presence of our God and with our loved ones.

______________________________

Ula Gillion, Author

JesusCarriesMe

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