The birth of Jesus can be described in one word: love. God is love. And it was His love for mankind that He gave Jesus to us, for us, and in our place.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. John 3:16
We know the verse so well. God’s love in action: the greatest love giving the greatest gift for the most undeserving. Then Jesus came and laid down His life for us. It is a quality of love we simply cannot grasp. Paul prayed that we would understand this love:
…that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge… (Taken from Ephesians 3:17-19)
How can you know the love of Christ which passes knowledge? You can’t! The best we can do is to believe it, and, as Paul prayed, become rooted and grounded in it and let love become the driving force of our lives.
Love gives, because love cares. It is interesting to note that the first mention of love in the Bible is not in the context of love between a man and his wife, or between parents and children, but the love of a father for his son:
Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” Genesis 22:2
Abraham loved Isaac because he was born to him in his old age, when it was naturally impossible for the couple to have children. Isaac was special because he was the fulfillment of God’s promise to him. But Abraham’s love for God was greater than his love for Isaac, and he willingly gave him as a sacrifice when God required it from him.
Looking back, we see what Abraham could not see: God used Abraham to rehearse an act of love that would play out millennia later, when He would actually do what Abraham was willing to do: give His beloved Son. And He did so because He loved us!
In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 4:9,10
Jesus was born to die. God’s love revealed by His death totally overshadowed the joy of His birth.
The gift of His birth was only the first step of God’s love toward lost humanity, to draw us to Himself, to once again embrace us as His very own.
The complete Gift that we celebrate includes the horrors of the cross, and His glorious resurrection from the dead. Yes, the greatest Gift of all times hung on a tree of a different kind.
He left His Father’s throne above
So free, so infinite His grace:
Emptied Himself of all but love,
And bled for Adam’s helpless race;
’Tis mercy all, immense and free;
For, O my God, it found out me.
Amazing love! How can it be
That Thou, my God, should die for me!
~Charles Wesley, 1738
The Father’s love for His Son, once sown in faith as Seed, returned to Him multiplied:
For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren… Hebrews 2:10,11
God’s gift keeps on giving!
A very prosperous 2025 to all of you!
Johan & Gerda du Toit
