Come Lord Jesus

   Eight days until Christmas!  Our hearts yearn for the coming of the Lord.

   The glory of Christmas seems almost lost in our secular world.  The gift of a new video game or the latest cell phone overshadows the greatest gift of all .  The parties, the food, the fun becomes the focus rather than the birth of our Savior.  Jesus becomes almost an after-thought to many.

  I'd like to take a step away and travel to a small cave in Bethlehem.  I want to hear the cries of a newborn infant, He who is to save my soul.  I imagine the joy of Mary and Joseph as their baby boy, the one they know is the Word of God, becomes one of us.

   Our Holy Mother blessed to bear the Son of God in her womb and bring Him into our world.  The honor given to Joseph who would be His adoptive father, the one who would protect both mother and Son; would teach Him the skills of a carpenter.

   I want to sit in the fields with the shepherds and see the glory of the angels in the sky, singing glory to our new-born King.  To journey with them to that cave and honor Him.  How I would like to ride along with the Magi as they follow the star to the blessed Child.  What gift could I bring, I wonder?

   There is so much noise, so much confusion pushing the real meaning of Christmas out of our mind.  We have a hard time filtering out all the interference so that we can experience the joy of the day which is coming upon us.  Earthly concerns that don’t really matter keep us from contemplating the greatest gift of all, the birth of our Savior.

   I want to turn off the outside world for a while.  I want to go to the simplicity of Bethlehem on the night Jesus was born.  I want to forget the daily woes and frustrations of this day-to-day world and bask in the love of a God who loves me so much that He would become like me in all things but sin.  A God who would choose to die for me to pay the price for my sins and open the doors of heaven that I might live eternally with Him.

   “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as the only-begotten Son from the Father.” (John 1: 14).