A Thought For The Week Of December 21, 2015

"I am come out from the Father, and came into the world: again I leave the world, and go to the Father." (John 16:28) Linkages are important. Unless we can link together the story of Jesus' life then all we have are short snippets without context. Christmas can fall prey to that especially. I wonder how many people know the basic story of Christmas but have little knowledge of the rest of the story of Jesus' life? And the result of that is that Christmas becomes little more than a story, with little meaning or purpose to it. John 16:28 seems to be a remedy to that problem, in that at the very least it links together Christmas with Good Friday. In a way, this one verse presents to us the span of Jesus' entire life. And it is so full of hope for those who believe in Jesus. Jesus is the perfect human - fully divine but also fully human; human in the way God wishes all of us were! And, in a way, Jesus is what God promises us that we will become. In addition to everything else, Jesus is God's grace given to us and for us, and grace is that divine quality that allows God to look beyond our flaws and to see us as we were meant to be. God, by grace, is able to see us without sin and promises, through Jesus, to return us to that state. And that returns us to John 16:28. Jesus came from the Father and Jesus returns to the Father. The manger and the cross are intertwined. And, ultimately, isn't this to be so for all of us? Did we not all come from God? And is the promise of the Gospel not that we will return to the God from whom we came? I see John 16:28 not just as a statement about Jesus, but as a promise to all of us. Christmas and Good Friday held together, with Easter as the ultimate hope! God is our origin; God is also our destiny. Christmas to Good Friday to Easter.