CHRISTMAS GIFTS, BOXES AND WRAPPING PAPER

It depends on how many family members, especially children, you have had on Christmas day as to how much ‘trash’ you will have to remove and carry to the street for the workers to pick up. In our area, you can see the blue cans that are placed on the street are filled with ‘trash’. As we are now in the last days of this year it is good that we dispose of some of our ‘trash’ if such we have in our hearts and lives. The apostle Paul stated it in this fashion: “Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him…” (Colossians 3:5-10). In other words we all need to take an inventory of our lives and make sure that we discontinue those habits and sins that hinder our running “the race that is set before us” (Hebrews 12:1, 2). In the case of the gift and the giver, both are most important in spiritual matters. We are informed in John 3:16 that God gave the greatest gift ever – His Son to die for our sins on the cross of Calvary. The apostle Paul wrote in Romans 5:6-8, “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Just ponder for a while what is said here. We were not friends of God when He gave the greatest gift, His Son; rather, it was when by our own sins we were alienated from God (Isaiah 59:1, 2). Not only that, the Gift (Jesus Christ) also gave Himself for our salvation (John 15:13). The motive was pure love of the Father and the Son. Because we have been the recipients of salvation, “the gift of God”, (Ephesians 2:8), we should give ourselves in the service of our Lord Jesus Christ. There are teeming millions of lost souls who need to hear the good news of our Savior Jesus Christ (I Corinthians 15:1-3) which “is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16). There are lonely souls who need our attention and affection. “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble…” (James 1:27). The inspired writer in Hebrews 12:12 gave this exhortation, “Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees…” There is much work for Christians to do as we spread the gospel and help those who are in need of our help. Let us remember the encouraging words Paul has given us as found in 1 Corinthians 15:58: “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”