Giving The Perfect Gift Series

And then Gabriel left Mary with words that you and I should already have not just memorized but etched into our minds and hearts as truth. It is the words of verse 37 that says “For nothing is impossible with God.” Can I just get real this morning? Some of you are feeling like Mary this morning. You are in an impossible situation. Some of you are in an impossible situation right now. You may have lost your job and don’t know where God is calling you next? Nothing is impossible with God! Are you wondering how you are going to be able to provide a decent Christmas for you and your family? Nothing is impossible with God! Are you struggling with a child? Nothing is impossible with God! Is your marriage on life support? Nothing is impossible with God! Are you lonely this holiday season? Nothing is impossible with God! Are you wishing that you could just be happy? Nothing is impossible with God! Are you experiencing overwhelming anxiety in life? Nothing is impossible with God! Do you feel unloved this morning? Nothing is impossible with God! Do you feel that you can’t go on? Nothing is impossible with God Amen.

If God can reach all the way down from the throne of Heaven to the body of a teenage virgin, if He can enter time from eternity, if the infinite can become an infant…think about what he can do in your life. In this entire passage the awesome extraordinary God became flesh. The one who created all things emptied himself into a human being so that we could have everlasting life. How did he do it? I have no clue. Mary didn’t know. Gabriel didn’t know. You can’t know things like that. You just have to leave them up to God. And, as Gabriel says, “nothing is impossible with God.”

On that first Christmas, God gave the perfect gift in the form of Jesus the God who Saves. But it would not be fair for us to just receive a gift this morning; we have been taught that it is always better to give than to receive so let me ask you as we wind up our message this morning. What are you planning on giving God for Christmas? You might say Chris, you know finances this year, you know the situations we are facing, I don’t really have anything to give back to God? Well let’s look at what Mary gave. After all she was like us. She did not have a lot to give back to God. She did not have the money, etc to give but yet she still had something to offer God and she gave him the only thing that she had to give. Mary gave God herself. Verse 38 she says, “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said?” Did you catch that? No arguments. No complaining, No whining, no ‘Why me’. No excuses. No postponements and No refusals. Just surrender. “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said?” What better gift could a person give at Christmas? It’s really what God wants!

I read a story that I thought was a perfect illustration as to what the perfect gift looks like at Christmas. It centered on a school Christmas pageant. Of course there was nothing there to make it religious. Only snowmen, reindeer and the like. And so the kindergarten class was to sing a song and the name of the song was Christmas love. And so the children had large letters that they were to hold up as they sang the song and so there was the C which stood for Christmas and then there was an “H” that stood for Happiness and an “R” well you get the idea. And they would continue this until they had the letters up that spelled Christmas Love. Everything was going well until the small quiet girl who had the letter “M” held up her sign. Pretty soon the kids began to giggle and laugh as the song kept going on. They were laughing at the little girl who had the “M” sign. The “M” girl did not know they were laughing at her and she still held up her letter high. The song continued and the last letter was raised and when the last letter was raised all the laughter died down and there was a hush as kids and parents began to understand what was going on and why they were there. That little girl with the “M” they had laughed at her because she had held up her “M” upside down to make a “W” Yet at the end of the song there was no laughter because the message of Christmas spoke loud and clear as the message those kids held up said Christ Was Love instead of Christmas Love