There is no deeper model of love than the incarnation. The Creator became like the created so that creation could be restored. This love is the essence of God; it is his nature. This love is unmerited, unconditional, unchangeable and indescribable. This love must be experienced to be understood.
This is where we struggle. We have no baseline for this kind of love, so we hear the words, but we do not know what to think or how to respond. Surely we must do something to earn God's love. Surely we must behave properly to maintain God's love. Surely we must attempt to regain God's love when we have failed so miserably to love him and to love others. Surely we...
Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn't, and doesn't, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn't been so weak, we wouldn't have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him. (Romans 5:6-8, The Message)
This is the essence of the good news that God's angel announced to the shepherds in Bethlehem so long ago. Our attempts to impress God had failed. Our attempts will always fail. The angel of God announced that this does not matter. The angel said that we no longer had to worry about this because God had made a way. The angel said that love had come to town.
Have you found this love? Have you experienced it? Have you embraced it? Come on, let's go to Bethlehem and find love. Come as you are, it doesn't matter. Love is here...
Please check the following blogs regularly during this advent season as we will all be making "random" Advent posts in some kind of synchronized fashion:
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