Christmas Characters

As I was thinking about the coming of Christmas this year, I started thinking about the myriad of characters that make up the Christmas story, and realized that like many other Bible stories, the Lord sure uses an interesting assortment of people to fulfill his plans.

I thought of the wise men. Men who literally knew nothing about the Saviour, but knew that they needed to find him. They wanted to know more. They saw the value in seeking the King of Kings.

Then I thought of the Shepherds. It was revealed to them that the Saviour was born, and they went away telling the good news and worshipping. They would not keep it to themselves.

I thought of Mary, and her willingness to say "May it be as you say" and "My Soul Magnifies the Lord" after being dealt some serious life change! While her physical circumstances may not have always caused her to feel like agreeing, she was still able to say, "Despite what is happening in the physical, I will follow God's plan for me. I surrender my will and follow God’s plan."

I also thought of Joseph and his willingness to walk alongside what God had revealed for Mary to do. While he didn’t have to go along with it, he walked out God’ will alongside her and was her helpmate. 

I don’t know where you are in your life, or whether you relate specifically to any of these characters, but I see the specific attitudes and actions of each character as valuable to our Christian walk.

We do need to be seekers like the wise men. I love the quote “Wise Men Still Seek Him.” Our King of Kings has so much to who He is that we have yet to discover. We need to make the 'journey' to discover more of him.

We also need to be spreaders of the news. The shepherds make me think of people in the church that go and live it out and then come back to church to worship. They shared the important news with everyone they saw, and then came to worship Christ. I pray that this may be me!

One of the hardest challenges is to be like Mary. Willing to follow God’s plan for our lives, even if it is crazy! Being willing to follow our soul’s feeling rather than what the Physical is saying, and surrendering our entire lives to God is a key aspect of being a true follower of Christ! What a way to live!

Finally, we need to take a lesson from Joseph and walk alongside those who have been given a great calling from the Lord. Get involved. Put ourselves on the line too. Be the helper and supporter. Knock on a few doors on behalf of those we love.

I pray that I will become a tremendous mash-up of the characters in the story. They all had so much to offer, and so do we.

Kourtnay K.