Christmas Features and Figures
By Jerry Batson, Th.D.
Special to The Alabama Baptist
Last week Theology 101 focused on angels and carols as features of our Christmas programs and pageants. As we continue using common features and figures associated with our celebration of Christmas as pointers to biblical truths, we focus this week on gifts and guests.
To the extent resources allow we typically find several seasonally wrapped gifts under the Christmas tree. Behind our custom of giving gifts lies the example of the wise men bringing their gifts to the Christ Child. The extraordinary example of gift-giving that first Christmas was the fact that God Himself so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son to be the Savior of the world. Hence, we might say that gift giving is a Godlike thing to do.
This season of the year affords us opportunities to be givers of gifts. To the extent we are able we give gifts to family members and friends. A common question sometimes posed at Christmastime is, “What did you get for Christmas?” This was especially common in our childhood years.
For grown-ups a better question to ponder perhaps is to change the verb from “get” to “give” and ask ourselves, “What did I give at Christmas?” The Christmas season affords us a special opportunity to give to people we have never met and will likely never meet, namely by making generous gifts for missions. By extension this is a primary way of obeying Christ’s mandate to go into all the world to proclaim the gospel and make Christian disciples.
In addition to giving and receiving gifts we often invite guests to join us at Christmas or we join others as their guests. This custom reminds us of the guests who showed up at the time of Christ’s birth, guests like the shepherds and, later, the wise men.
A somewhat negative example about entertaining guests was the anonymous innkeeper who had no room in the inn for Mary and Joseph to be received as guests. His redeeming feature, however, was he did give what he had available — space in the inn’s stable.
Inviting guests into our home brings joy at Christmas but inviting heaven’s Guest into our hearts brings everlasting joy. I believe the hymn writer phrased it best, “O come to my heart, Lord Jesus, there is room in my heart for Thee.”
The Christmas season is an ideal time to make certain we have made God’s gift of His Son the welcomed Guest in our lives — a Guest who will abide with us forever both for God’s glory and our good.
Share with others: