What comes to mind when you think of Christmas? Smiling family members sitting by a lighted tree, a fire roaring in the fireplace, hands wrapped around mugs of hot cocoa as you sing “Joy to the World” together? Kids dashing downstairs at dawn to find everything they ever wanted under the tree? Or maybe you think of the family members you’ll be missing this Christmas because you’re separated by distance, disagreement, or death. Perhaps your Christmas memories are painful, your current holiday situation is stressful, or your joy is clouded by the sadness of friends and family who are walking through the holidays without a loved one.
No matter where your family falls on the spectrum from delightful to dysfunctional, Christ was born to redeem you and bring you into God’s family.
Galatians 4:4-5: But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.
This is why Jesus came. Not just to heal the blind and change water into wine. Not only to tell us how to love others. Not to start a new religion. He was God’s Son, born of a woman to redeem those who were under the law. We were living under the curse of our inability to keep God’s law, so Jesus came to redeem us with His perfect life and to die in our place.
And as He redeemed us, we were adopted into God’s family. As God’s children, we are loved fully and perfectly. Not because we are good children, but because we have a good Father. No matter how messy our earthly family interactions get, we can rest in our Father’s love demonstrated to us in our redemption and adoption through Christ.
No matter what you face this week, you have been redeemed and adopted because God sent forth His Son.
Share