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Christmas 1 - Birth of Jesus ...

Monday, Dec 21, 2009. How would you explain Christmas to someone who does not know it. We celebrate the birth of Jesus, who is the key person of Christian faith. He was born around 2000 years ago (in fact today we think that his birth took place in the year -4 BC, i.e. it was 2013 years ago). He was born in the town of Bethlehem, while his parents were traveling due to a census of one of the Roman kings. All hotels were full, his parents had to stay in some shed and there the little baby was born. This event is pictured in various artistic images around the Christmas days.

We cannot understand the meaning of Christmas, if we do not talk about the meaning of Jesus. We would not celebrate Christmas today, if we would not believe him to be someone very special. Every human is special in his or her role. We are all special in our gifts and talents, in our character and experiences. Jesus was special in another way - according to original Christian insight. He was so special that his role can only be called unique for the complete history of mankind.

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Christian faith states that there is a God, a creator and eternal being. God made the earth. God is there, he is the one who is the beginning and the end. Our whole world has been started by him. As Christians we share this faith with several other world religions. But Christian faith is unique in the way we think that God wants to live with mankind. God has created humans to live with him, to live in his presence. We are all created to have a deep and trustful relationship to the eternal creator. He wants to be with all of us, with every single human, every day.

But we have to state that we are not living with God, we are even so far from him, that we do not realize his existence any more. Mankind, as we know it, has been separated from God as far as we can think back. This separation is usually called “sin” in the biblical literature.

God wants to overcome the separation of mankind. He wants to bring us back into his presence and into a life which knows and experiences truth, love and solidarity. God wants to lead us back to the source of life. That is the story of Christmas. We might not experience God today, we might be far off and think that all that religious stuff is nonsense. But we all have a sense of the need for truth, love and solidarity. We all know in our hearts that someone like Jesus is desperately needed in our world, to break the vicious circles, to live in love and dedication.

Jesus is born - he is God coming to mankind as a human, in his “son” Jesus. The birth of this child, today celebrated at and with Christmas, is God's new beginning with mankind, his new start to overcome the separation. It is a big event, something really revolutionary. He is coming to us! [R.W.E.P., jesusnetwork.eu]

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jn_en_2009_12_21.txt · Last modified: 2017/06/18 16:48 by 127.0.0.1