“Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people.
Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.”
(Luke 2:10-11)
From since our childhood, we have thought of Christmas as the most wonderful time of the year. We have listened to the story of the baby in the manger, the angels, the shepherds, and the wise men so often that we can almost recite the scriptures from memory. We have sung our favorite Christmas carols year after year and no longer need a hymnbook to sing them. And no one needs to remind us that Christmas is the celebration of Jesus Christ’s birth.
But, most likely, there are some of us who may not have discovered the JOY of Christmas. It seems that no matter how much you enjoy the holiday season and its festivities, the emptiness you feel deep within reminds you that the “great joy” promised by the angel has not been your personal experience.
This saddens me, because I believe that Christmas is about much more than just a fun-filled event. It is intended to be a personalized experience of much JOY. The Christmas story is like a letter addressed to each of us personally, inviting us to see, hear, and feel the life-changing JOY of the story’s good news.
As soon as the angels disappeared into the stillness of the night, the shepherds hurried to Bethlehem to search for this baby, this “Savior.” They had heard the good news, they believed, and they went and “found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.”
Filled with JOY they quickly spread the “good news that will cause great joy for all the people” to others as they returned to the fields and their work of caring for sheep, “glorifying and praising God for all the things they heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.”
Matthew tells us that Magi traveled a great distance to find this child who was “born king of the Jews” to worship him. Guided by a star, they eventually found the child with his mother Mary. Being “overjoyed” they bowed down and worshiped him, and then gave him gifts.
From its beginning, the Christmas story is a story of JOY. Repeatedly, fear and bewilderment become joyous rejoicing in song and worship. And down through the years of time, this good news of a Savior born to us, has been carried on the wings of song and carols.
So, if anyone of us is not experiencing the JOY promised by the angel, maybe we need to ask ourselves if we really believe the Christmas story; and maybe, more importantly, have we personally claimed and opened the gift of salvation that this baby, named Jesus, brought down to earth from heaven for each one of us.
Occasionally we read of someone who lived like a pauper, virtually starving themselves to death, even while they had thousands of dollars stashed away. We think this is tragic. But even more tragic is the person who celebrates Christmas, singing the familiar carols, listening to the Christmas story being retold, yet missing its JOY of because they either feel no need of a Savior, or have their life so cluttered with other “gods” that they have “no room” for the “holy Child of Bethlehem.”
If this be you, I enthusiastically invite you to find and experience the JOY of Christmas by sincerely singing the prayer printed as the last verse of “O Little Town of Bethlehem.”
O holy Child of Beth-le-hem, descend to us, we pray,
Cast out our sin, and enter in, be born in us today!
We hear the Christmas angels the great glad tidings tell.
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Em-man-u-el.
I urge all of us to pray this prayer humbly, sincerely, and fervently, during every year’s celebration of our Savior’s birth. If we do, I assure you that we will find and experience the JOY of Christmas throughout the days and weeks that follow.
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“The Healing Rays of Righteousness” – December 21, 2022
Ray M. Geigley
Healing Rays of Righteousness 
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