Niki Anderson ~ Author & Speaker

I’m reveling in Christmas.

I’m not focused on Matthew’s blessed history of “shepherds abiding in the fields” though I never tire of reading the story.

Nor have I thought much about three astrologers traveling in search for the king of Israel, though I’ve always been curious about Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar.

Neither have I lingered over the scriptures relating Joseph’s reassuring dream to take Mary as his wife, or even the star over the stable in Bethlehem.

Why? Christmas didn’t begin in Bethlehem of Judea. It began in the plan of God before the foundations of the world, and was first mentioned by God Himself in the Garden of Eden. Christmas? Yes, Christmas.

The first promise of Christ is recorded in Genesis when God addresses the serpent. God said of Eve, “Her offspring [Christ] will crush your [the serpent’s] head, and you [the serpent] will strike his [Christ’s] heel.” God foretold the defeat of the tempter at the cost of his stricken Son.

The promise of a deliverer continued through Abraham the father of faith, and Judah the son of Isaac; through Rahab the redeemed dove of Jericho, through Jesse and his son David.

Hundreds of years forward the promise waited after Solomon and Josiah and after Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary and later parent to Jesus. Forty-two generations lived and died, knowing Christmas would come—someday.

After Assyria ransacked Israel and Babylon carried off Judah, four hundred years of silence transpired between the last mention of a prophet, or king, a message or messenger. Then suddenly. God broke the silence. He so LOVED his world that he GAVE his SON.

My heart has filled to swelling with John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.” LOVE ended the centuries of waiting. A virgin conceived.

LOVE bombarded the last silent year. LOVE smote the darkness. LOVE arrived with the answer. God so LOVED the world. And God GAVE when He planted in young Mary the seed of Himself. LOVE gave us the Son to show us the likeness of God and to provide a sacrifice for sin.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.” It’s the verse we memorize in Sunday school, and commonly view in December on billboards and business placards. It’s the theme of Christmas, the heartbeat of God.

This season, I marvel. Because God LOVED me, because God GAVE His only Son to Adam and Eve in the garden, and to Niki in Spokane, and to all the world who will invite him to the manger of their hearts.

Merry, merry Christmas, Niki Anderson