DAILY DEVOTIONAL – January 4, 2021
“Kiss of Salvation”
Prayer: God, we praise You and worship You for the beautiful mystery of Your love and salvation, a mystery revealed to us in Your Son given for us, Jesus Christ, our Lord. We pray and praise You in His name. Amen.
Scripture: Hebrews 4:15
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
Devotion – “The Kiss of Salvation”
Have you ever wondered why God had to come in the way that He did in order to save us; as a vulnerable infant whose very life was at risk the moment He was born? If you haven’t ever wondered that, there are plenty of people who do. Much of the world can’t understand why God, if He is the single, all powerful, all knowing, and eternal God of all, had to become a human to save humanity. Why couldn’t He have just forgiven us?
Well, the long and short answer is that our God is both a loving and a righteous God. God is loving, and as such, He didn’t just wipe us out after Adam and Eve rebelled and sinned against God. Out of His pure love, God promised to provide for our salvation and forgiveness. In order for there to be forgiveness, however, sin had to be answered for. There is a right and wrong and God is a God of righteousness and justice. If God were to have turned a blind eye to the fact that His holy word and commands had been disobeyed, if He would have simply pretended like sin never happened, He would not be a perfectly righteous God or worthy of our worship. God is loving, and God is a God of justice. Sin must be paid for and held accountable. If we were to be held accountable for our sins, we wouldn’t be alive simply because we are sinners. So God had to do this Himself, because only He is perfect, only He could take the sins and guilt of the world and pay for them, because He Himself had no sin. If Jesus was not born of a virgin and conceived of the Holy Spirit and was not in fact God in the flesh, He would not be worthy, He would have sinned as we do, and joined us in suffering God’s judgement rather than suffering it for us as He did. God’s love and justice must come together, His faithfulness and righteousness must go hand in hand without either of them being compromised by the other. The good news of Christmas is that the mystery of God’s perfect love and justice, His perfect faithfulness and righteousness did come together in the mystery of Immanuel, the Christ Child, God with us.
The Psalms said this would happen and prophesied about it long ago in psalm 85:
10 Steadfast love and faithfulness meet;
righteousness and peace kiss each other.
11 Faithfulness springs up from the ground,
and righteousness looks down from the sky.
12 Yes, the Lord will give what is good,
and our land will yield its increase.
13 Righteousness will go before him
and make his footsteps a way.
Verse 13 personifies God’s love, looking forward to the faithfulness and righteousness of Immanuel by saying these perfect attributes of God will actually make footsteps on earth!
Christ had to live a real human life and suffer as we do and die as we do. God’s love doesn’t just forgive and forget. God’s love forgives us by upholding His justice, but instead of His wrath of righteousness falling on us sinful people, God cast it’s full horror on His perfect Son Christ, who God raised again because He in and of Himself was perfect, and worthy. In doing so, God dealt with our sin in love, and we receive that love and forgiveness by believing and receiving what God has done for us.
God’s love and justice is the primary reason Jesus has to come as He did. However, God’s love doesn’t end there. Jesus didn’t rise again and leave us here to figure it out on our own and endure this life alone.
Jesus came to save our life and soul, and to know this life personally, to help us personally, and guide us all the way into the eternity He purchased for us in His own blood. Jesus knows what it means to be afraid, as He sweat blood in the Garden of Gethsemane anticipating the horrors that awaited Him on the cross. Christ knows what it’s like to physically hurt – more than we will ever know. Christ knows what it’s like to be emotionally hurt, as He was betrayed by those He loved and who were closest to Him. Christ knows what it’s like to have nothing – even the clothes on His back, the only things He ever owned, were gambled away after His death. Christ knows what it’s like to be undervalued and underappreciated – He was sold for a pitiful 30 pieces of silver. Christ knows how to be perfectly obedient and faithful to God in all circumstances because He has literally walked in our shoes and then some – and done it perfectly and faithfully for us.
As we continue to look at some of Luther’s Works on Christmas, I think you will find great encouragement in what Luther says about why Jesus had to come as He did.
That is the good news of Christmas my friends. Thanks for joining me for another devotional in God’s Word, and remember, that God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today, and has already taken care of tomorrow. Amen.
