We Have An Obligation…

The above is part of Paul’s exhortation to the church at Rome to live according to the Spirit, and not according to the flesh, Rom 8:12, NIV. While we employ the same earnestness in our encouragement, our context is slightly different. Our current focus is on our responsibility to cherish the significance of Christmas in our hearts and to continuously apply the implications of this crucial event to every area of our lives.

For the believer, Christmas cannot be a mere season of temporary docile attitudes, fleeting good behavior and specious generosity. For those that are in union with Christ, we understand that Christmas marks the beginning of the end, the beginning of the end times or the beginning of the eschatological consummation to which the sovereign Lord had pre-appointed his entire creation, in the beginning. We have the solemn charge to remember and to cherish this overall historical-redemptive perspective for at least two reasons:

Firstly, herein lies the hope for our present life and our life to come. Our Christian worldview, that is, our way of understanding the context in which we live in all of its ramifications, applications and extensions, compels us to realize that as sinners who have been born again, who have been born from above, God has deposited into our hearts, the knowledge of his purposes in this world in order to prepare us to live with him in the next. As such, we have an obligation to share this hope with others. We have an obligation to communicate this good news of the eschatological kingdom of God’s breaking into the here and now in the First Coming of Christ, to those with whom we come into contact. We have an obligation to honor Christ the Lord in our hearts as holy, “always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,” 1 Pe 3:15. This is not a seasonal responsibility or an intermittent duty but an ongoing commitment, even a divine call. We are to teach, charge, encourage and plead with others, to know and to embrace [the gospel of] Jesus Christ as the very core and context of their lives. This naturally leads to the second obligation.

Secondly, we are to seek Christ’s kingdom with a relentless and unapologetic passion. Is this not our Lord’s instruction in his Sermon on the Mount: “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”? Mt 6:33. This kingdom was regained by the Last Adam, Jesus Christ, who in his sinless life, death, burial, resurrection and ascension, conquered Satan, death and sin and in so doing, redeemed God’s kingdom that was initially entrusted to the First Adam who sinfully surrendered it to the evil one through an act of scandalous unfaithfulness. This is the reason of the Incarnation of God in Christ: “..The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.” 1 Jn 3:8. The New Testament clearly teaches that the redemptive action of God in history is inseparably connected with the First Advent of Jesus Christ. In technical terms, we say the Incarnation is propaedeutic (from two Greek words pro – before and paideuin – to teach, instruct, train or discipline) to the atoning sacrifice of Christ. In other words, its meaning does not lie in itself but in that event which it subserves or to which it leads. We have an obligation to remember that Christ came the first time to usher in God’s kingdom. The kingdom of God was present in full display of power because the conquering King had come! See, for example, Lk 11:20. We are to seek this kingdom as the priority of our lives because it is the realm that we will share with Christ when he comes the second time.

We have a privileged obligation to cherish and communicate these eternal truths.