our brilliant morning star

"And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High;
for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
to give his people the knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of their sins,
because of the tender mercy of our God,
by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
to shine on those living in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.”

Luke 1:76-79

I remember one Christmas season coming across this verse in Luke about the birth of Christ as if I had never read it before. I'm sure I'm not the only that finds verses in very familiar passages speaking to us as if for the very first time. And maybe like you, at Christmas time, when we feel so familiar with its story, it almost becomes impossible to hear it fresh. We hear sermons, children's plays, abbreviated versions on TV and in movies, and slowly Christmas isn't new, and its lost its power to surprise and delight.

Yet I remember those surprising words 'God's tender mercy', and Christ as the 'rising sun' in regards to the advent, to the first parousia of Christ. Christ incarnate is like a beautiful and amazing sunrise on a dark and dying land. I need visual pictures to help me sometimes and often Christmas gets relegated to the image of a manger- tiny, small, insignificant. But here in these very verses Christ's birth becomes huge, larger than life and the most beautiful and wonderful thing in all the world.

Well this was a few years ago, but this advent I was drawn to this line from 2 Peter 1:19

'We also have the prophetic message as something completely reliable, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. '

You're probably thinking what on earth does this have to do with Christmas or advent, but here's the connection; this verse along with a good part of 2 Peter points us to the second parousia, the second coming of Christ, which is compared to the morning star in our hearts. Do you get the connection? The first advent was the morning star, sunrise on earth but the second and final one will be a sunrise in our hearts. That is how big and powerful and beautiful Christmas really is because what happened 2000 years ago will reach its ultimate culmination in us when Christ comes again, when the morning star will rise in our hearts forever. No more darkness, no more sin, no more evil - just glorious, beautiful, brilliant life and light forever.

So this Christmas as you reflect on the incarnation, on the birth of Christ let it draw you to His second coming, ever big, ever powerful, ever glorious!!!