He Gave Everything
My church did a concert Christmas night, and one of the songs the choir sang was Ron Hamilton's "He Gave Everything." As I pondered the words, I came up with three possible interpretations of that phrase. I know you want to know:1) Jesus gave up everything for us. This is a common, powerful reminder of Christ's love for us. We Christians are frequently reminded at Christmas of all Jesus gave up in leaving heaven to come to earth to die for us. "Out of the Ivory Palaces" is a lesser-known Christmas song that focuses on this truth. It the same idea found in Philippians 2: Jesus was equal in every way to God, but He was willing to humble himself and become a man in order to save us. That is amazing.
2) Jesus gave His all for us. Let's extend the first meaning into another area. Not only did Jesus give up all of those things to come to earth, He gave the greatest gift imaginable—His life. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend." Jesus gave everything He had to give to us. Not only a human life, but His relationship with the Father, his perfect holiness ("He became sin for us who knew no sin") were sacrificed on our behalf.
3) Jesus gave everything to us. Let's take the next step. Jesus gave up all those things in order to restore us to a right relationship with God. Now we are children of God, joint-heirs with Christ of God's promised inheritance. A way has been opened to allow for us a perfect relationship with the Father. What more could we want? Jesus death has made possible everything for us. We were freed from the power of sin. Jesus gave up everything He had (to later reclaim it) and allow us the same privileged position as God's children. The blessing of being saved are limitless. Truly, Christ has given us everything.
Please just let me remind you of these things. I know you've heard them all before, but some things are worth repeating (and some of us need things repeated before we catch on). Our God is amazing. I'm so thankful He loves me.
At 10:21 AM,
That God should forsake heaven and give His life for me, sinner that I am- God's love is truly overwhelming. Thanks for the reminder, Justin!
At 3:12 PM,
We always need reminded of this powerful message because we always seem to forget (at least I should change the "we" to an "I").
At 1:24 PM,
justin, thanks for the good reminder...im glad to see that you haven't completely forsaken your blog