Brian G. Hedges : A Meal with Jesus by Tim Chester (Book Notes)

Brian G. Hedges : A Meal with Jesus by Tim Chester (Book Notes): In preparation for my sermon last Sunday, I read Tim Chester’s excellent little book, A Meal with Jesus: Discovering G...

Three verbs and one bequest…1

We have now entered into the season of joy and happiness. The Christmas season. Apart from shopping, partying, going to church, family gatherings and gift sharing, can we learn anything from Christmas?

“For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

The above verse is from the Bible and it is the pearl of Christianity. If we squeeze the entire Bible into one verse, in fact if we are to condense Christianity into one single statement, it is this verse. It is the essence of Christmas. Everything about Christmas is in it; the why (purpose), the how (process) and the what (product). It is a treasure box of twenty six words, beginning with God and ending with life, and that too straight from the mouth of God in flesh (Jesus), two thousand years ago.

This mind boggling and heart stilling statement is small enough to write on a post-id, but strong enough to cause two thousand year old debate. Yet it changed the millions of lives, transformed countries, stopped wars and conquered the hearts of humanity. It simply states that God became Man to show how much He cares about Man. It is the hinge on which Christianity hangs. It is the reason for Christmas. It has three verbs – loved, gave, believe and one bequest – Life.

First Verb

If there is one ridiculously over used word in English, for that matter in any other language, it is ‘Love’. But it still has the power to bring two enemies together, stall a war, and bring down a wall that divided a nation into two. It can cause a ripple turn into waves of emotions, unfold the untold rhythms of life and joy in a person. It is a beautiful state of mind and heart. We would love to be in that state, don’t we?

Christmas is about love, not just any love but God’s way of love. They say there are four kinds of love (Eros, Philo, storge, and Agape), there is Sensual love, brotherly love, affectionate love and then there is Godly love. All of us are capable of the first three kinds and probably are experts in it, but the fourth is a speciality of God. Many a times our relationships fail and our dealings with others suck because we really do not know how to love. And in the story of Christ, God showed us how we also can achieve it, even though we might stumble few times. (well! we will stumble a looootttttttt of times!) Christmas educates us about true love, God’s way of love.

Do you want to know the kind of love God has for us…well… “Look at the round belly of the pregnant peasant girl in Bethlehem. God’s in there; the same God who can balance the universe on the tip of his finger, floats in Mother Mary’s womb. Why? Love.

Peek through the Nazareth workshop window. See the lanky lad sweeping the sawdust from the floor? He once blew stardust into the night sky. Why swap the heavens for a carpentry shop? One answer: Love.

Love explains why He came; Love explains how he endured.

His hometown kicked him out. A so-called friend betrayed him. Hucksters called God a hypocrite. Sinners called God guilty. Do termites mock an eagle, tapeworms decry the beauty of a swan? Yet God chose to allow it. Why? Love.” (Paraphrased from Max Lucado – 3:16)

True Love is supreme and it is sublime. It is a virtue only God has and He gave it only to human beings. God’s way of love involves two aspects, unconditional acceptance and forgiveness. And these are the two most important ingredients for any relationship to work.

Christ teaches us to accept people irrespective of who they are, that is caste, colour and creed. Living in a country which is divided in all aspects of its constitution, haven’t we all experienced some kind of set back or being castrated or out casted  by someone on the basis of wrong caste, wrong colour, wrong social status, wrong size or wrong address? It hurts and causes an unseen divide that runs deep in our hearts and among people of this country. This Christmas season may be we learn from Christ and become sensible and learn to accept and respect, those around us, just as they are.  There are people out there in the cold, hurt, angry, lonely, desperate,  desolate, and they need at least one person to accept them and to lean on. You could be one this season.

People hurt us, they back stab and betray us. They break our hearts with their actions and insensible words. They mock, insult and deceive us. We all have someone in our lives who committed the unthinkable. We find it hard to let that go off our lives and understandably so. There is one danger in garnering anger and vengeance, it will never make you happy. Resentment never helps. Yet that is exactly what we do when people hurt us. We become bitter, angry, cynical. We get all closed in and self-pitying. Bitterness hurts you far more than any hurt you will ever receive. No matter what anybody has ever done to you. Resentment is a self defeating attitude. It doesn't work. Today, revenge is big business. Revenge doesn't work. It always backfires. It keeps the hurt alive. When you retaliate against the hurt all you do is escalate the pain. There's only one way you'll ever get the relief and that's forgiveness.

Forgiveness doesn't mean that you say "It's OK that you hurt me." Forgiveness is not minimizing the hurt. Forgiveness is not saying it didn't hurt. Forgiveness is not denying that evil is done in this world. Forgiveness is allowing yourself to be healed and letting go off the guilty one unconditionally. Christ taught that while he was on the earth, people don’t deserve to be forgiven, and yet we choose to forgive them, and that’s God’s way of love. Doesn’t God forgive us all the time? Think about it. Do we really deserve all that we have in lives? I doubt it.

Do you suspect that we will never be able to exhibit that unconditional love of Christmas in our lives?…Read the story of Christina.

We will look at Second Verb in next post…