It’s
Christmas Eve, the children are excited and parents are eager to see the excited
faces and hear the sounds of joy when their children open their gifts. Even
followers of Jesus enjoy giving gifts and experiencing the joy of watching
family and friends opens their gifts of love. There may be fewer gifts this
year, but the love and joy that accompanies the giving of gifts is still there.
This evening we’re remembering the greatest gift God has given us, the gift of
his son Jesus, the child in the manger, the one the angels offer up their gift
of praise for.
The
angel’s song is often called Gloria in Excelsis Deo, Latin for Glory to God in the highest. Jesus’ coming is not only
a gift to us here on earth, but it’s a gift to all of creation, a promise to
all creation that God is one the move to reverse the impact of sin that entered
into the world through humanity. Jesus comes during a time in history where the
Pax Romana, the Peace of Rome covered the majority of the known world at the
time. It was a forced peace enforced by Roman soldiers, an absence of violence
and war. The angels sing of the gift of peace, “and on
earth peace to men on whom his favour rests.” This promise of peace is a
deeper, longer lasting peace that the Holy Spirit offers within our hearts,
souls, minds, and lives, a peace that is filled with comfort and hope, a peace
that brings healing and renewal in us and between us.
In
a world where war ravishes places like the Ukraine, the Congo, and
other areas where there is localized fighting, to our own country where
political leaders find battling each other instead of working together is
better for them, to those relationships in our own lives that are broken or
stretched really tight, the angels offer “peace to men
on whom his favour rests,” to those who accept the Prince of Peace as their Lord, peace that can heal
relationships and the brokenness of our hearts as we come closer to Jesus and
allow his Spirit to remind us of Jesus’ great love and compassion for us.
God’s
peace gives us the strength to move forward, to learn to trust, to help us to
offer compassion, love, and forgiveness since these are the very things Jesus
offers us as part of the peace he brings. Jesus came into the dark and
brokenness of our world to shine his light, the light of the world, to bring
hope and remind us that we are God’s people and he has come to be with us.
Jesus is the gift of God’s love for us and he comes looking for us, seeking us,
finding us. This is why we sing for joy on this evening before Christmas, an
evening that invites us to come close to Jesus and experience his favour.
Father
Stephen Freeman writes, “Peace on earth and good-will
towards men receive a very specific content in the incarnation of Christ. The
angels sing because Christ is born. Without His birth, there is no peace nor
good-will. His birth proclaims the beginnings of God’s peace on earth, the
in-breaking of the Kingdom of God. His birth proclaims good-will – God’s good
will towards men, the only good-will that matters. The angel offers
God’s peace and goodwill to those on whom his favour rests, to those who accept
this child in the manger as their Lord and Saviour.
We
are also reminded by Paul in Philippians 2, “In your relationships with one another, have
the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not
consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather,
he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in
human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he
humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross! Therefore
God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every
name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in
heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that
Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” On this Christmas
eve, we approach the manger to acknowledge that Jesus is our Lord and that he
is the source of our peace, and we join the angel song, “Glory to God in the highest!”
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