Friday, December 24, 2004
With two teenage boys who love football, one Christmas gift is sure to be a hit - a new leather football. And when it's a rare 60-degree Christmas morning, you're not just going to sit around the Christmas tree and admire that ball - you're going to go right outside and do what you're supposed to do with a football. So the three men of the house were quickly out of the house and in the middle of the street, passing that football back and forth. I was back for a long one - the pass was right to me. And I caught it - right on the end of my little finger, like the Christmas klutz. The emergency room is not where you want to spend a chunk of your Christmas, but that's where I was - with a special souvenir of that Christmas - a broken finger.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Something Broken at Christmas."
Take it from me, it is no fun having something broken during Christmas. Especially if what's broken is a relationship you really care about. Or your family is broken. Or your heart is broken. All the "joy to the world" around you just seems to make the hurt even worse. And often the Christmas season brings painful reminders of the things that have hurt us the most.
You need to know that the One whose birthday we're celebrating knows about what's broken and He knows how much it hurts. He cares about the pain, He cares about the loneliness, and He really understands. Remember, this Jesus who came that first Christmas was, in the words of the Bible, a "man of sorrows and familiar with suffering" ( Isaiah 53:3). He was misunderstood and abandoned. He was betrayed, falsely accused, even put to death. So while everyone around you may be celebrating and totally unaware of how you're hurting, you need to know that Jesus is moving close to you today, and He wants to do something very powerful for you this Christmas. That's why He's led me to talk about this today. His Word says, "The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit" ( Psalm 34:18).
In Isaiah 61:1, our word for today from the Word of God, the Son of God says, "The Lord has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted." He really is the fixer of broken hearts, broken lives, and broken people. Because He came to do something about what's at the root of all our brokenness. There's a reason we use each other, hurt each other, and let each other down. Something's very wrong in our world - something's very wrong in us. It goes back to our living with our back to the God who put us here. We simply aren't living as we were made to live - God's way. We have this deadly disease of me called sin that's ignored God over and over again. And sin is a killer of everything beautiful - everything that matters.
In fact, sin killed Jesus. He absorbed our death penalty for our sin to remove the wall between us and the God whose love we need so much. And the broken things in your life are a painful reminder of your deep heart need for a love and a security that you can't lose. Only God can give you that.
So the body of Jesus was broken to repair the broken relationship between you and God - so He can move in and fix and forgive what's broken inside you. In fact, this very day, the one who came on Christmas is coming to you, offering you this opportunity for Him to come into your life with His love. But you have to open the door to let Him in.
This could be your Jesus-day - the day you finally experience what it is to belong to the one who loved you enough to die for you and was powerful enough to conquer death. Just tell Him, "Jesus, I've lived without you long enough. You died for me. I can trust you. I'm yours." And please let me send you my little booklet Yours For Life. It will help you know you really belong to Him.
What a Christmas this could be. What a new beginning! Being broken can drive you into the loving arms of Jesus Christ where you can finally be whole.