Come Let us Worship, Day 20, December 20

1 John 3:16–17 (ESV)

¹⁶ By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. ¹⁷ But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?

We might all complain and even criticize the mountains of toys and presents at Christmastime in this western world, but the idea is not wrong. Christmas and giving go hand in hand. ““For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16, ESV). When Paul encouraged the Church at Corinth to keep their commitment to support the famine stricken churches in Jerusalem; and when he used as an example of the Macedonian generosity, he grounded all this in the Gospel:

“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.” (2 Corinthians 8:9, ESV). So the exchange of gifts at Christmas is intended to be a reminder of the greatest gift of all. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23, ESV)

This is not to deny the exorbitant, perhaps wasteful giving at Christmas.  It is to say the idea is right.  One other thing, the original gift exchange at Christmas was far from fair.  2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV) records this exchange:

²¹ For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

This is the gospel — the good news that our sins are laid on Christ and his righteousness is laid on us, and that this great exchange becomes ours not by works but by faith alone. “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,” (Ephesians 2:8, ESV).  This gift exchange was full of inequities, but full of grace and mercy.

Father our gift exchange at Christmas is a very poor example of what it is to typify.  In the Great Exchange, you gave to us your righteousness; we gave our sin.  We are truly the beneficiaries of mercy. This Gospel truth and reality is to be the basis of unselfish giving in my life toward those in need.  May we be transformed by the Gospel, rendered generous.