Love and sharing the Good News

Merry Christmas Eve!  With Christmas now only a day away we are preparing to switch gears from Advent to Christmas; from the longings in exile to the joy and good news which has come into the world.  Our messiah is coming.  Through Jesus's birth we see God's love demonstrated; we see the lengths He has gone through to show His love of us to us.  Jesus went on a missions trip to Earth to be our good news.

We remember the awesome truth of Emmanuel ("God with us") who came to this dark and lonely world.  God is with us and we can rest in the truth of His love.  We have the assurance that humanity in all our depravity cannot push God from this world.  Try as we have throughout human history, we cannot eclipse His love; we cannot make Him who is faithful give up.  God's love for this world is too great to be drowned out, and this incomprehensible truth continues to bring me awe.

With this in mind, an often un-discussed but central topic to Christmas is the un-reached people groups of the world.  We can relate to the people of Israel who waited in darkness for the coming of the Lord, and now we too are waiting for the Second Coming.  Our hope is in the assurance Jesus is coming back to bring us home.  Our exile will end and we will be with God.  As we prepare to celebrate Jesus's birth and His Second Coming, there are almost 3 billion (Joshua Project) people who have not heard the truth of Jesus's first coming.  Christmas is about the good news coming to Earth; not to certain regions, not only to the Church, but the whole world.

John the Baptist was sent ahead of Jesus to "prepare the way of the Lord" as testified by all four Gospel authors.  He fulfilled Isaiah 40:3-5 and went before Jesus to be the voice crying out in the wilderness.  John's great task was to go into a dark world and begin testifying about Jesus to any and all who would listen; he prepared the way for Jesus's first coming.  Similarly our great task is to (like John) go before Jesus and prepare the way for His second coming.  Like John we are called to be the voice in the wilderness crying out "prepare the way of the Lord."  We are not called the comfortable, we are not called to the complacent; we are called to "the wilderness" and "the desert".  Our task is not an easy one; we are called to serve the hard, dry, and resistant areas.  Finding such places does not require stepping much beyond our front doors, but on a global scale we have to consider the regions and people groups who have no access to the good news of Jesus.

As we transition from Advent to Christmas may we remember the un-reached who have not heard about our Emmanuel.  We will once again celebrate the truth that Jesus has come into the world and life will never be the same.  May we be people who will take this truth, the light of this good news, and carry it to those still in darkness who have no hope.  May we not look to the Second Coming without thinking to share the message of the First with all the world.