If I were to ask you to tell me what Christmas really means, I’m sure many of you would do what I tend to do: In your head, you begin to picture “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and the scene where Linus recites Luke 2:8-14 to the whole gang after Charlie Brown asks if anyone knows the true meaning of Christmas.
“This wasn’t just something we were supposed to just put on a greeting card - this was something that was meant to change our lives!”
However, there’s far more to it than just those verses. When the angels declared, “goodwill toward men”, (Luke 2:14) they weren’t talking about a time of year when we would all be nice and pleasant to each other. They were crying out from the heavens, “God is sending His grace and goodwill to all of humanity!”
You see, this wasn’t just something we were supposed to just put on a greeting card - this was something that was meant to change our lives! No longer was God going to hold our sins against us - now, Jesus has come, and He has invited us all to receive from His grace freely!
That grace provided so much to all of us - beyond just the forgiveness of our sins. It also provided our healing, our prosperity, our wholeness in relationships, and more, as a part of our salvation.
The word salvation comes from the Greek word, “sozo”. In his study Bible, the Baptist Scholar C.I. Schofield said that the Greek word sozo actually contains all of the redemptive acts of Jesus Christ!
“When He was on the cross ...He was paying the price for everything you would ever need here on the earth and in eternity”
That means that when He was on the cross He wasn’t just paying the price for the forgiveness of your sins, He was paying the price for everything you would ever need here on the earth and in eternity - making it available to you now the same way your forgiveness is available - by grace, through faith.
So this Christmas season, don’t just go around and proclaim “Goodwill toward men”. Really think about what that means. If we were to realize what God actually meant when He sent His son to earth for us, it would change our lives forever.