Today, the world celebrates Christmas in a very commercial way. Hence, we have advertisements like: “Cheese-mas” for cheese-burgers or “Sea-mas” for visit to a water theme park. To Christians, Christmas is the time when we celebrate the birth of Christ who came to this world, about two thousand years ago, to save us, sinners. How can we celebrate Christmas meaningfully? Here are a few suggestions.
Worship God with a grateful heart. Praise and thank God, the Father, for loving us so much that He sent His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, to this earth to save us, from God’s wrath and to give us eternal life. Praise and thank Jesus Christ for coming down from heaven to suffer and die for us. Praise and thank the Holy Spirit for helping us to believe the Gospel message and for dwelling in us — guiding and empowering us to live Christ-like lives.
Be Christ’s ambassadors in this world. A story is told of some salesmen at the airport. In their hurry to catch the plane, they knocked down a fruit stand. They did not stop to help pick up the fruits because they were late and the plane was about to take off. When they reached the gate, one of them, a Christian, decided to return to the fruit stand to help. When he reached there, he discovered that the fruit-seller was a blind girl. She was groping around for the fallen fruits and asking passerby to help her. Nobody did. The salesman then helped her pick up the fruits. He apologized and even compensated her for the damaged fruits. As he was about to leave, the girl asked him, “Sir, are you Jesus?” He replied, “Oh no, I’m not Jesus! Jesus won’t knock down your stand and walk away.”
The girl said, “Then you must be Jesus’ representative because I’ve just asked Jesus to help me pick up the fruits.”
As Christians, we are to be Christ’s ambassadors or representatives daily. Let us be the salt and light of the world; Christ’s instrument of love; His hands and feet — in praying for others, visiting, providing hospitality, service, help, and encouraging and even admonishing one another with great patience, careful instruction and godly wisdom.
Be Christ’s witnesses. Apart from preaching the Word (2 Timothy 4:2), witnessing includes showing people how real Jesus is in one’s life. From my experience, when people see how real Jesus is in my life, they are more willing to know more about this Jesus that I talk about. It opens the door for planting the seed of the Gospel or watering it, or harvesting the crop. (1 Corinthians 3:6-9; John 4:36-38).
Be Christ’s disciple-makers. Making disciples is Christ’s commission to every Christian (Matthew 28:19,20). But some of us may say, “I do not know how to make disciples.” One way to overcome this is to learn from a mature Christian. Apart from teaching the Word of God, making disciples includes being role models for Christ. We can be a model Christian spouse, parent or parent-in-law, son or daughter or son-in-law or daughter-in-law, friend, boss or employee, student, client or customer, etc. In short, we can be role models for Christ in different ways and capacities to different people — especially to the next generation.
May God grant us many opportunities to praise and thank Him, and to be Christ’s ambassadors, witnesses and disciple-makers this Christmas and in the year ahead.
Have a blessed Christmas, and a joyous and fruitful New Year!
By Mr Lim Han Soon (YCKC Bulletin 24 December 2017)