Second Opinion: The cheering of Christmas

December 16, 2005

Posted: 12/16/05

SECOND OPINION:
The cheering of Christmas

By BO Baker

We all need the cheering of Christmas. It seems the whole world recently has experienced the heaviness of hurt, stain marks unabated, and questions that have struck in powerful forms of aftershock. Name a nation–any one will do–that has been exempt from the clash of swords, the heavy thunder of drums announcing new vistas of crime.

Yes, without question, we need the cheering of Christmas.

This passing year has been one of “saying goodbye” to many friends and loved ones of a lifetime. We grew up together with the treasury of the church around us. We have fought lest it be mocked, left in need of redefining. Far too many of our fellow travelers have exchanged the promises of God to provide “shoes of brass and iron” (Deuteronomy 33:25) for roads impassable … untenable. Millions of the fear-filled would gladly exchange their mechanical toys, their “wagons without wheels” for the promise of a cheering Christmas.

Heaven knows we need a divine visitation, a word from God. We need Jesus to make the difference–and oh, the difference he does make! It is true that the Master of Heaven and Earth does care, that he proved it by the nativity and offered his grace by way of a cross full of forgiveness. All this caught the listening ears of the World Maker, and Jesus turned to walk head-high out of the waiting place; then he brought it all tied together and loosed it on a lost world at Christmastime.

Let us call it the cheering–the cheering of Christmas.

If honest confession is “good for the soul” (and with that I most surely concur), then it is this cheering Christmas the believers most fervently desire. Pray tell, where else may we turn to find depth enough, power enough, hope enough and the strength of hands strong enough to hold us in the anxious anchoring of the soul? Come floods untamed, unsalvageable homes, rising water, the dread of family wakes has put the whole world on storm alert.

Apart from the Christian faith, there is little worth holding on to help us find a heart for tomorrow. Nothing save the holy gift of God–the cheering of Christmas.

BO Baker, a longtime Texas Baptist pastor and evangelist, has written a Christmas reflection for the Baptist Standard 30 consecutive years.

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