The Gift of Relationship

I love Christmas Day.  Today is no exception.  I like the fun of seeing the gifts I've wrapped make people smile.  I like opening my gifts to enjoy the fact that I have been thought of and loved.  I love eating, I love Christmas music.  I love the whole thing, but what I am really reveling in is the fact that I am spending time with people I love. 
Right now, my daughter is playing a video game with her friend down the street.  My youngest daughter is watching bonus features on the "A Christmas Story" with Greg and myself.
It's just a warm feeling when people are together, even if they are not roasting chestnuts or decking the halls with boughs of holly.

It strikes me that the whole reason Jesus came was motivated by some of the same togetherness that I have been loving this Christmas.  Jesus didn't come to prove he was bigger than Satan and could save the world from sin, though he is, and did.  He came because he was so passionate about making a way for mankind to cuddle up and be in God's presence.

The fact remains, that if Jesus did not come as a tiny infant when He did, we would not be able to call God our father, and not be able to stand in the presence of a holy God who can not tolerate the presence of anything less than perfection.  Jesus is the solution to the dilemma between God's passion for holy perfection, and God's passion to be united with His creation.

So Jesus came to make a true, lasing relationship between God and mankind--all those who would accept Jesus as the bridge between humanity and God.  No one is forced to walk that bridge,  but all who do enter into the relationship they were designed to have.  God's passion to relate is the greatest gift of Christmas.

I want to use Christmas as a launching pad--to relate more intimately and personally to God than I ever have in the past.  I want to put away the trappings of going through the motions and really relate to the God who went to the trouble of becoming like me so He could restore my relationship with Him. 

The gift I most want to receive this year is one I have already been given:  The gift of a deeper relationship with God Himself.