Merry Christmas

I know that this might seem out of place as we prepare for Christmas, the celebration of the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. I don’t want to take away from the beautiful, peaceful manger scene with Jesus lying in a manger with shepherds and animals surrounding the new baby and parents. Jesus was born into a sin-stained, fallen world. His mission was to live the perfect life we could not live and pay the price for our sin that we can not pay. Jesus did it by becoming a true man while remaining true God. He is a true man to be born under the law. He is true God so that He could live the perfect life the law requires. Jesus’ death on the cross satisfied God’s judgment on sin. Jesus’ righteousness is given in exchange for our sin to all who trust in Him.

After His resurrection, we still live in a sin-stained world. This reading from Revelation shows us God promise of how Satan will be defeated forever and how those who trust in Jesus will live in a new world free from sin, death, and the power of the devil.

Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—Gog and Magog—and to gather them for battle. In number, they are like the sand on the seashore. They marched
across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night forever and ever. (Revelation 20:7–10)

A moment of silence, please.

Pause and let this be true: evil is judged and utterly destroyed. Forever and ever. Not just in the fairy tale, but here in reality, in our Story. Satan, his armies, and every form of evil are destroyed with a punishment that never ends, under justice unrelenting.

It feels like a ten-ton weight being lifted off my being. What will it be like to be no longer assaulted? To be utterly free from accusation; to look in the mirror and hear no accusing thoughts or voices. To be completely free of all temptation and the sabotage of your character — not because you are successfully resisting it in a moment of great resolve, but because it is no
longer in existence, anywhere in the world. What will it be like to have the dark clouds lifted between us and our beloved Jesus, that veil that so often clouds our relationship with him? Imagine when all the physical affliction, emotional torment, abuse — all the evil in this world has vanished.

Think of it — what evils will you no longer have to live with personally? Oh, the joy we will experience when we get to watch with our own eyes the Enemy brought down for good, cast into his eternal torment! Oh, the hope that begins to rise at the thought of a world where the Enemy no longer gets to do what he does. To see our loved ones released from their lifelong battles. To be released from our own lifelong battles, knowing with utter surety that the kingdom of death and darkness is forever destroyed. As we celebrate the birth of our Savior this Christmas, it is good, right, and salutary that we know where life under the cross leads. Merry Christmas,
everyone.