Christmas Devotional: 24th December 2020
How many Christmas Services have you been to in your life? How long have you spent sitting through nativity plays, or singing carols that make lofty proclamations like “Come and behold Him, born the King of angels”. Perhaps, like me, you’ve become somewhat numb to the depiction of the incarnation – has the glory of it ‘worn off’ for you?
Interestingly, John takes a somewhat different approach to the other 3 gospels (the synoptics). Rather than describing the classic nativity scene at length, John spends just half a chapter on the incarnation – however, through this John helps us see the wonder of Christ coming down afresh.
It’s easy to skim over today’s passage without taking in the sheer magnitude of what it says – I know I did on my first reading of it. But let’s slow down and take a closer look at what John tells us. In verse 14 we read that ‘the Word became flesh and lived among us’. That God, creator of the heavens and the earth, chose to dwell amongst us – a deeply sinful people, living far from him. More than that, verse 16 shows Jesus didn’t leave us as we were, but instead lavishes ‘grace upon grace’ on us. I find this tricky to wrap my head around sometimes – it just feels so radical, counter-intuitive, and even scandalous. Yet this is the incredible nature of Jesus’ birth – how might you be able to recognise this gospel truth afresh this Christmas?
John goes on to draw a clear contrast between Moses and Christ (v.17), between the Old and the New Covenant. Moses was probably the closest anyone came to ‘seeing’ God in the Old Testament (take a look at Exodus 33 & 34). Yet even he could only see God’s back, and for the rest of Israel their worship of the Lord was codified through complex & ritualistic temple practices. In these few verses, John showcases the vast superiority of Jesus over Moses – ‘grace and truth’ are made available to us through Christ, far surpassing the law that preceded it.
In John 14, Jesus explains that “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” – the temple curtain is split in two, access to God is no longer restricted but instead through Jesus we have a new & great high priest. God longs to be in relationship with each of us and made way for that through Jesus coming down. Christmas offers such a great opportunity to reach out to people – who is God calling you to share this with? How can you invite them to see more of who God is through the person of Jesus?
As we come to the end of our Advent devotionals, I’ll leave you with the first verse of today’s passage – in this, John tells of the beauty of the Christmas message better than I ever could. Spend some time in quiet, meditating on these words and asking God to reveal new wonder in Jesus’ birth.
“And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” – John 1:14