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ALL GOD WANTS FOR CHRISTMAS #3
A CHRISTMAS CARD FROM THE LITTLE RED-HAIRED
GIRL
Well, friend, I hope you and your family and loved
ones are enjoying a beautiful, blessed Christmas season. What a sweet
gesture that with all the special things to do and experience, you’re
committed to joining us for these 15 brief minutes as we think about what
the Christ Child still means to this sorry old world.
I’m realistic enough to know that the Voice of Prophecy faces three formidable
media competitors here at this festive time. One is Jimmy Stewart in It’s
a Wonderful Life. Number two is a kid named Peter Billingsley in that
annual program, A Christmas Story, where a young boy wants for Christmas
nothing more than a carbine action two-hundred shot lightning loader range
model air rifle BB gun. To which his parents respond, as all good moms
and dads must, “No, honey, you’ll shoot your eye out.” As soon as we’re
done here, go turn on TNT; it’s probably on right now. And number three,
of course: A Charlie Brown Christmas.
Well, I put the great Peanuts classic last and best because we’re thinking
all this week about gifts we can give the Lord. What present can we bring
to Jesus here on His birthday? And in the insightful old book, The Gospel
According to “Peanuts,” theologian Robert Short reminds us of a scene
between Charlie Brown and his compatriot, Linus. In between trying vainly
to fly a kite, and kick the football that Lucy holds for him, and losing
baseball games 900 to nothing, and trying to learn his portion of Luke
chapter one for the annual Christmas play, Charlie Brown has found the
time to also fall in love. But it’s not going very well, as we’ve all
looked on with sympathy now for the past 50 years or so. “Do you know
why that little red-haired girl never notices me?” he asks Linus, almost
in tears. “Because I’m nothing! When she looks over here, there’s nothing
to see! How can she see someone who’s nothing?” There’s a long pause and
then Linus ventures a brilliant reply. “You’re depressed, aren’t you?”
If poor Charlie Brown had to pick a carol to fit the mood, it would probably
be “In the Bleak Midwinter.”
But friend, the reality of Christmas is that you are not “nothing” to
God. When He looks down at your neighborhood, He doesn’t see nothing;
He sees YOU. The whole you: struggling, trying, hoping, growing, sometimes
failing, sometimes succeeding. More than St. Nick ever could, He knows
where you live and what kind of year you’ve had. And unlike the little
red-haired girl who never makes an appearance, who is never seen, God
chose to come to Planet Earth in the form of His own Son, to see and be
seen among us.
And, here on the 24th of December, just as Charlie Brown’s fondest dream
would have been to have this beautiful little girl come over and sit down
next to him, that’s exactly what God would like to experience with you
this Christmas. In a recent issue of Leadership magazine, a Pastor Sacks
from Villanova, Pennsylvania, shares this story:
“When I was a missionary in Paraguay,” he writes, “a
Maka Indian named Rafael came and sat on my porch. I went out to see what
he wanted. He responded, ‘Ham, henek met.’ I asked what I could do for
him, but the answer was the same. ‘I don’t want anything; I have just
come near.’ I understood what he was saying, but not its significance.
A veteran missionary explained that Rafael was honoring me. He only wanted
to sit on my porch. He found satisfaction and pleasure being near me.”
It’s an amazing thing to discover that God, the King
of the universe, feels like that about someone so insignificant as me.
Or you. Exodus 19:4 paints a sweet word picture where God says to His
lonely orphan children, the Israelites:
“You yourselves have seen what I did in Egypt, and
how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Myself.”
Isn’t that perfect? These past two days we’ve borrowed
some lines from the late A. W. Tozer, who has a great essay about the
REALITY of the love of God for us. And, just as Charlie Brown has made
himself emotionally vulnerable in falling in love with the little red-haired
girl, God has essentially done the same. Listen to this:
“It is a strange and beautiful eccentricity of the
free God,” Tozer writes, “that He has allowed His heart to be emotionally
identified with men. Self-sufficient as He is, He wants OUR love and will
not be satisfied till He gets it. Free as He is, He has let His heart
be bound to us forever.”
You know, we talk about Santa making a list and then
checking it twice. And I suppose we have a picture of God doing the same
thing — and maybe bringing us presents based ON that list. But might I
suggest that, here on Christmas eve 2003, we do the same thing? Make a
list? Think about how many ways God has shown us His desire to be with
us? How often He’s blessed us? How often He’s made an overture in our
direction?
In his Christian bestseller, The Ten(der) Commandments, Ron Mehl helps
us truly understand the significance of God’s move in our direction this
December. Let me share just a bit of it with you:
“In [Psalm 116:13, the psalmist] says, ‘I will take up the cup of salvation,
and call upon the name of the Lord.’ This word ‘salvation’ is not a reference
to being saved as we mean it today; Old Testament believers didn’t understand
salvation as we do in the shadow of the cross. It was rather a reference
to the many times the Lord had salvaged him, helped him, sustained him,
and saved him from trouble and grief. His life was full and overflowing
with God’s goodness.” Then Pastor Mehl confesses: “I have a cup like that,
too. And in this cup of salvation are the many times God has helped me
overcome doubt, disappointment, and failure. The times when He spared
my life, kept our children from danger, protected us from rash, foolish
decisions, and paid our bills. He’s been so good. He has loved us and
reached out to us and delivered us even when we were unlovely. He has
made such a commitment to us in His love. And NOW He is saying, ‘Would
it be asking too much — knowing that I love you with a sacrificial, serving
love — would you consider making ME the most important thing in YOUR life?
Would you consider Me as first in your life, just as you are first in
Mine?’”
And friend, right there — that’s the Christmas invitation.
“I want you,” God says. “I want all of you. I want the best of you.” Why?
Because He’s so madly, crazily in love with us. Nothing more, nothing
less. He just can’t stand being apart. He can’t stand not having me or
you. He wants us to come to HIS porch, and take a seat, and say quietly
to Him, as Christmas slowly slips into history, Ham, henek met. “God,
I find satisfaction and pleasure — ALL my satisfaction and pleasure —
in just being with You. In being Your child.”
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