Jon Allen

The presents are opened, boxes discarded, tree taken down, house reassembled and all has returned to what we call normalcy. If you are one to set New Year’s resolutions, they are established for the year. All has become ordinary again; maybe too ordinary.

It is too convenient to “get through” Christmas and New Year’s Day and simply return to the status quo. Even those resolutions fall to the side abruptly as we return to life as we know it.

But the season we just celebrated is an important one. It is a time to remember a rescue mission. And that rescue mission should stay in our minds and hearts every day.  

We read stories about heroic rescues by first responders and even brave citizens. I recently watched a video of an 18-year-old that was reacquainted with the police officer that courageously saved his life when he was a young boy. It was a very touching story of bravery and thankfulness.

As I watched the video, that so happened to show up the week of Christmas, it got me contemplating what Christmas is truly about. It is a rescue mission.

Often, I hear folks question the goodness of God as we look at the brokenness of our current culture. How can a good God allow such evil? How can a good God allow such hate?

To know that this is not the world God had planned is important, but not very satisfying, especially if we are dealing with extreme difficulties in our lives. God created a perfect world with beauty and two perfect people with whom he had a close relationship. There was only one stipulation.

It didn’t take long for that stipulation, that instruction, to be violated. And with that violation all creation was broken. That perfect relationship between creator and created was severed, reinforcing the question: is God good? But immediately that creator planned to restore that relationship. He planned a rescue mission in which he would send his son, God the Son, to rescue his people. That is what Christmas is about.

But just as those who are rescued must reach out a hand to receive that help, so must we reach out our hand to our rescuer, our Savior. John 3:16 details on this when it says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” The relationship was rescued!

We just need to reach out and believe that Jesus being born, living a perfect life, and then taking our sins to the cross rescued us and restored our relationship with him. Romans 10:9 says, “If you declare with your mouth “Jesus is Lord” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

Will we still live in a broken world? Yes, we will. But we will walk through this life with a Savior and Lord that promised he would never leave us and after this short life, spend eternity with him. Let’s not just go back to the ordinary. Let us not too quickly forget the rescuer that came to our broken world to make us his children again.

(Jon Allen is associate pastor at Grace Point Church in Powell.)