During the Christmas season, I always appreciate seeing greetings from those serving our country while stationed around the world. They often say something akin to, “Merry Christmas to you and your family…” I wish those TV spots ran throughout the year with different messages reminding us of those who love our country and sacrificially give their time and risk their lives to protect us. It would honor them and their sacrifice throughout the year.
Among the many reasons men and women decide to join the armed forces, most, if not all, go with the understanding that they may give their life. They go with purpose!
The same and more is true as God the Father planned to send His Son, Jesus, to His earthly station. In one of the most well-known Bible passages we read that, “…an angel of the Lord appeared to (Joseph) in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).” (Matthew 1:20–23 (Emphasis mine.))
A particular mission requires a particular plan. God has never been reactionary; He has planned this since before time began (Isaiah 53:10; Acts 2:22-24).
Jesus, the Son of God, was sent by the Father, through the miraculous conception from the Holy Spirit for a particular mission. He did not come to earth simply to be a good example; He came to save his people from our sins!
Two primary objectives were required for this mission of saving His people from our sins to be completed: the God-Man would live an absolutely perfect life in thought and deed; and He would willingly and undeservedly allow Himself to be murdered on a cross at Calvary. Could there be any greater love? The answer is unequivocally, “No!”
Jesus taught His disciples, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:12-17) He loved us with the most sacrificial love possible in all the world. The perfectly righteous God-Man willingly left His Heavenly home, came to this earth for the precise mission of dying for you and me! We celebrate with joy because we have been perfectly loved.
Does this change, or strengthen, your affections for God? If so, you will respond to His sacrificial mission by turning to Him in humble, repentant love, laying aside your own desire to live as the king of your own heart/life) in order to take up His mission to us: to live all of life for the One True God by loving Him and one another with enduring love, enabled by the indwelling Holy Spirit.
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