30-Day Writing Challenge

Day 16: Something that you miss[ed]

There are days when your heart can break again with doubts and hurts and old lies wrapped in new whispers. Days when tears might slip down without warning over your bowl of oatmeal. Days when fear of the future clutches your heart. Days that seem long and least like Christmas joy.

And then you read Ann Voskamp’s words:

“God gives God. That is the gift God always ultimately gives. Because nothing is greater and we have no greater need, God gives God. God gives God, and we only need to slow long enough to unwrap the greatest Gift with our time: time in His Word, time in His presence, time at His feet.”

Then comes Romans 8:32 –

“He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all – how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?”

The meaning of the story in Genesis 22 suddenly becomes startlingly clear. God told Abraham, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains …”

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son …”

God told Abraham to take his son whom he loved, whom he had waited 100 long years for, and give him up – sacrifice him on Mount Moriah. But at the last moment, God had said, “Stop!” and provided a substitution.

Yet thousands of years later, God sent His only Son whom He loved to be a sacrifice on the mount of Golgotha – and He didn’t say stop – because this Son was the substitution for us.

God gave Him up for us all.

He gave Him as a baby.

He gave Him in the most unexpected of ways.

He gave Him so that we might be written into His story – His perfect plan of redemption.

He gave Him so that the requirement for our sins might be met – in the only One who didn’t deserve to die.

He gave Him because that was the only way enemies of God could be made into friends of God.

He gave Him with eyes filled with love and mercy.

God the Eternal slipped into incarnation – into a mother’s womb – into a dirty stable – into a world that rejected Him.

God the righteous King of Kings allowed Himself to be humbled to the lowest – allowed Himself to be betrayed – allowed Himself to be crucified – allowed Himself to endure all the wrath of God Himself.

He gave us all things through His death on the cross.

How will He not then richly meet every need and every desire we have? Every longing we have is met in a Savior who gave up everything – including His perfect unity with the Father – to become Emmanuel – God with us.

He has never ceased loving us, never ceased being with us. It’s only the sin and hurt and decay of this world that blind us, that keep us from seeing this miracle of miracles. That keep us from believing in the one thing that will give us all the freedom and all the hope.

Because the holiday of Christmas itself can never make right all of our hurt and pain. Only the baby born for sacrifice can bring healing to all our darkest places.

The Messiah in a manger – the world’s greatest surprise – is all that our hearts need to be satisfied. Are we willing to trust and believe a God whose plans have never failed from the dawn of creation? He’s already given us everything – all we have to do is receive it on bended knee.