God's Christmas Gift: Part II (It Came to Us Came Undeserved)
Matthew 1:18-23 This is how the birth of Jesus the
Messiah came about His mother Mary was pledged to be married to
Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the
Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did
not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her
quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord
appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to
take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy
Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus,
because he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to
fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will
conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means
“God with us”).
The Gift that God offers to us comes completely undeserving on our part. Mostly, people give gifts to those they feel deserve the present, those that have been kind towards them, and those they might want something from. People also give gifts to those who love them, and they love in return.
The great part of the free-gift given by God is that it not only comes with no strings attached, but it came to us even though humanity was in rebellion against God. Romans 5:8 tells us that "God demonstrates His love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." the Apostle John tells us that even though we did not love Him in return, God first loved us, "We love because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). Therefore, what God gave us was undeserving on our part. This love from God means there are no works or deeds we can perform to make God accept us or earn our own way into Heaven.
There are no great sins or little sins; all sin is equal and is rebellion against God. God is perfectly holy and just, He will judge all sin. The punishment for sin is eternal separation from God in an awful place called Hell. God does not look on sin, and without Christ, Jesus in our hearts and souls, God cannot look on us. We have the freedom to choose Christ Jesus or reject Him; God will not force anyone to be in His presence who does not want to be there.
If we choose to reject Christ Jesus, God will judge us not only on our deeds but the thoughts, desires, and motivation that generated those actions. Consequently, for us to make it into Heaven, on our own good deeds, we would have to be perfect in thought and deed, from the cradle to the grave. That is a "Mission Impossible" for any human being, given the sinful nature we are born with. There has never been or will never be anyone that can earn their way into Heaven. Moreover, no good deeds that we might ever do can erase past sin.
In reality, Good deeds are God's standard operational procedure (SOP). When you peel it back to the core, we might say that there are no such thing as good deeds, but a standard from God regarding how we should live every day of our lives. The salvation that we know is undeserved; what we deserve are death and Hell. Jesus freely went to the Cross to die for our sins, even though we were enemies of God. On the Cross, Jesus asked that God not hold His executioners' sins against them (Luke 23:34).
Christ Jesus, God in the flesh, guaranteed with His sacrifice our salvation through our faith in Him. And His resurrection is our guarantee that He is God in the flesh. Only Jesus, the Messiah, could lay down His life and pick it up again. Jesus did this for us because of His love for us, those he calls His children.
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