He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”
Read Revelation 21:1-7. Things are beginning to gear up for Christmas. Today is the first day of December! Before you get too far into the season, I invite you to stop and to receive the promise of Christmas: God is for us. God gets us. He understands the human condition. God wants to save us. From ourselves and from the world. God is always near us. He has “moved into the neighbourhood” (John 1:14 MSG).
But Christmas is not the end of the story! Jesus may well have arrived on a silent night in Bethlehem, but the Bible tells us he will arrive again one day. And not so quietly this time! The skies will open, the trumpet will blast, and a new Kingdom will be ushered in.
What will it look like? John tells us that Jesus will wipe every tear from our eyes, that graves will be emptied and the winter of death will pass into the summer of eternal life. Sorrow will end. Crying will stop. Pain will be healed.
The hope of Christmas will endure long after the last carol is sung, and the Christmas decorations are taken down. God’s promises endure. He offers each one of us a lifetime of hope.
May each of us live in anticipation of the thrill of Christmas hope.
THINK IT OVER
Think about the following:
If Christmas this year could be everything you ever hoped for, how would you describe it?