A GIFT TO REMEMBER
A gift to remember is something valuable you give to someone willingly without payment and not requesting it back at a later date.
It was my 21st birthday, I woke with excitement looking forward to what the day has for me, then I received a distant call from my step-mother who was miles away from me. She wished a happy birthday and told me to go to the post office for she had a surprise parcel for me.
Even though I did not know what it was, I was so excited because someone has thought of me and sent a gift. I picked the parcel from the post office and it was a beautiful wristwatch and I loved and cherished it so much.
And I never forgot my step-mother’s kindness ever since because I did not have any wristwatch then and her gift was something I was wishing for, so I couldn’t let it go, it was precious to me.
In the same way, Christmas is a time we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ who was a gift for the salvation of mankind when we lacked and wished for a savior.
Therefore, God decided to save us by sending us the gift of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ through the virgin birth which the scriptures teach that He was divinely conceived in the virgin Mary’s womb by the Holy Spirit, thus bringing together His two natures; deity and humanity. Luke 1:26-38; 2:1-35
The virgin birth of Jesus is foretold in the OT. The prophet Isaiah writes, “Therefore the LORD Himself will give you a sign; Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and shall call His name Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14).
The Hebrew word for virgin here is almah, which means a woman who is pure and virtuous, who has not been intimate with a man. The word appears only seven times in the Hebrew Scriptures, and in every appearance, it refers to a chaste, unmarried woman, not just a “girl,” as some critics suggest. In the Greek, the word parthenos means exactly the same thing; a woman who has not known a man-a virgin.
Divine Birth Of Christ
In the NT, we discover that the virgin birth is fulfilled (Luke 2:1-7). This passage teaches that Jesus of heaven, the Son of God, was miraculously born through Mary without the agency of a man, having been conceived by the Holy Spirit so that Jesus Christ could literally be said to be the Son of God on earth (although He was already-and forever-the Son of God in heaven before He was born of Mary).
There never was a time when Jesus was not, and there never will be a time when He ceases to be. He is the eternal, preexistent Son of God (John 8:58; 17:5). Because this is so, a special, divine arrangement was required for Him to enter into humanity: the miracle of the virgin birth of Christ. God allowed the eternal Son of God to be implanted in the temporal womb of Mary. And she carried the seed of the eternal Son of God for a nine-month term until He was born into human flesh.
Mary Believed And Knew The Purpose Of Christ
Despite these incredible circumstances, Mary was still human, and she loved Jesus as all good mothers do-willing to do anything she could to protect the child she had raised from infancy, And on the hill of Golgotha, as Jesus was about to be crucified, a small group of people gathered at the foot of the hill to watch. In that group was Mary, His mother.
To prevent Jesus’s death, all she had to do at that moment was step forward and say, “No, He is not the Son of God; He is the son of Joseph. Do not kill Him. I remember the night in some secluded place when Joseph and I first came together. This is not the Son of God!” But Mary stood there and watched her Son die because she knew in her heart that the charge against Him was true: He was the Son of God.
There is no other explanation for His birth. She had heard the announcement from the angel (1:26-38). She had been there on that glorious night when He came into the world, unexplained in human terms. He was the Son of God, and she watched Him die for what she knew was true. No loving mother could ever have done that had she known the truth of the matter.
As we contemplate all these things, we realize the miracle that occurred in Bethlehem needs to occur in our hearts as well. There must be a nativity in ever human heart-the Perfect coining to dwell within the imperfect-for we cannot give birth to Him, or to His goodness, on our own efforts. We need Him to enter our lives miraculously, still and quiet, as He did on that Bethlehem morning.
And because Jesus was a gift from God offered to us for our salvation, nothing could stop the purpose and reason for His coming into this world. He is the perfect gift for the season!
That’s all for now, live with purpose!