I think that ninety-nine percent of people love Christmas, but we often don’t know why we do. It’s not gifts; not even family. For me, it’s because Christmas gives us hope in a dark and dying world.
As we go through the Gospel of Matthew concerning the events around the birth of Jesus, we are deluged with hard and difficult things.
Think of how amazed and puzzled both Joseph and Mary were about the birth of the Messiah. Think of what a dark world into which He came. Herod the Great, the king of Israel, ordered the death of male children under age two in Bethlehem to get rid of the One who was “the born king of the Jews.”
When the Apostle John wrote “The Book of Revelation,” he showed the spiritual warfare in the heavenly places as Satan sought to destroy the Christ.
Later, Joseph had to leave Judea and go to Nazareth because the son of Herod the Great, Archelaus, was a worse and more ruthless leader than his father.
Even in all this, the hope of God comes through Matthew’s account of the birth of Jesus. It leaves us with an understanding that God is in charge, that He is at work, bringing good out of bad and preparing a place for us beyond measure and beyond imagination.
As we go through the days up till Christmas, let us focus on the hope that we have in Christ, and let us share it with the people around us.