Tuesday, December 21, 2010

He Came To Die

Christmas celebrates the coming of Christ. When someone goes somewhere, it is worth asking why they went there. If we are to rightly celebrate the coming of Christ we must celebrate the reason He came. Here are some thoughts on why He came.

1. To be with us.
2. Because we couldn't get to Him.
3. To die for you. In His own words, "just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matt 20:28

Now that's something to celebrate and ponder. Here is a great piece of literature to put the life of Christ into perspective.
One Solitary Life…
Here is a man who was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village. He worked in a carpenter shop until He was thirty. Then for three years He was an itinerant preacher.
He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had got married or had a family. He never went to college. He never put His foot inside a big city. He never traveled two hundred miles from the place He was born. He never did one of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself...
While still a young man, the tide of popular opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. One of them denied Him. He was turned over to His enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed upon a cross between two thieves. While He was dying His executioners gambled for the only piece of property He had on earth – His coat. When He was dead, He was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.
Nineteen long centuries have come and gone, and today He is a centerpiece of the human race and leader of the column of progress.
I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that were ever built; all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man upon this earth as powerfully as has that one solitary life.