The God who dwells with man.

  

Humans are just specks of dust on a tiny rock floating through the vastness of space. We seem so small and insignificant.  It seems impossible that we could ever know about or relate to the God who made and sustains the universe. It seems absurd that He should take an interest in us. So is the best we can ever hope to know about God just vague philosophical conjecture?

 

Worse still, we've all rejected God.  We live our lives to please ourselves and God is just an afterthought.  We think and do wicked things and hope nobody sees.  But God sees.  How can we ever hope to know God? How can we ever think of appearing before God without justly facing his anger and being swallowed up by shame?

The message of Christmas is that God has made Himself known.  He hasn't revealed Himself in some abstract sense, but by coming to live among us. In John's gospel we read

 ¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was with God in the beginning. ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.  John 1:1-5.

The Word is God.  He made the universe.  He made us.  He gives us life.  And yet, the Word became a man: Jesus.

 ¹⁴ The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14

The God who made us chose to limit himself.  He made Himself nothing: He became a man.  He humbled himself by living an ordinary life on this tiny speck in space.  He made himself a helpless baby born into a feeding trough in an occupied country. He lived with us, ate with us and wept with us.  And ultimately bled for us - enduring the humiliation and torture of the cross.  Why did He do this?  Why would He do this?

¹⁸ No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known. John 1:18

He did it so that we could know God.  By looking at Jesus we can see what God is like: He is full of grace and truth.  When we look at Jesus we see God's compassion, holiness, truthfulness, power and wisdom.  He doesn't gloss over our wrong doing but He offers us mercy.  Jesus makes God known.  Jesus could have come into this world just full of truth, and no grace, condemning us all.  He could have shown us God's purity and goodness exposing the darkness of my innermost thoughts and my rejection of God and left me there in despair.  But this was not why He came. God is full of grace and truth, yes he reveals our sin, but He didn't come just to diagnose the problem and leave us with no hope, He came because He loves us.  He came because He wants us to know Him, not just about Him.  He came to deal with the problem of my heart and take the punishment I deserve.  He died on the cross in my place, to take my punishment, so that I might know God and not face His his anger.

¹⁶ 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. ¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. ¹⁸ Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.  John 3:16-18.

This is why Christmas is such great news.  God has sent His Son that we might know Him.