I was watching a show on TV a couple of weeks ago and they were asking school children what Christmas was all about. There were two common themes that came out as they gave their answers. The first was "Presents." Not that you think of Christmas as being about presents, I'm sure! (How many people opened up their Christmas presents before they came to church today?) The second theme was love. God's love for us, our love for each other. Showing our love by giving and receiving presents!
	So I thought we might think about love for a little bit today. It might be good to think about love before we go home and have that traditional Christmas family row that so many people end up having on Christmas day. Perhaps if we're clear about the nature of God's love for us we'll be less likely to fall into that trap this year.
	We have a slight difficulty in thinking about love because it's one of the most overused and least understood words in our vocabulary. We use it in so many different ways: "I love Italian food." "I love James Bond movies." "I love my shiny new BMW roadster." "I love lying by the pool on a hot summer's day." "I love you." "I love God." We use the same word for all these different things as though they were all equal. And we use it in lots of different contexts. It can be used in the context of warm, fuzzy, close, feelings; it can be used of ecstatic, exuberant sexual passion; it can be used of an unconditional commitment to a relationship: "I'll love you for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish as long as we both shall live"; and it can be used of a conditional commitment: "I'll love you as long as you keep on meeting my personal needs." - never said quite that crassly of course, but nevertheless the meaning is sometimes there.
	So to say that Christmas is about love isn't necessarily enough is it? We first need to be clear what sort of love we're talking about. You might like to open up your bibles to John's first letter. That's down the back of your bibles on p230. John's big on love. It's one of the major themes of his gospel and also of his letters. It's probable that John lived longer than any of the other apostles and this letter was probably written at the end of the first century, so it's interesting that after all that time of living as a Christian leader, the two things he concentrates on in this letter are love for God and for one another, and the obedience to God which flows out of that love. Those words of Jesus must have made a great impact on him "By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." This is the great hallmark of the Christian: that we love one another. In fact he says if we don't love one another, we can't be born of God, because that's the very nature of God: "God is love." That should be a dire warning to us when we're tempted to ignore someone who seems unlovable shouldn't it? Remember that God loves everyone, even those who seem unlovable.
	So when John tells us to love one another, what does he mean? Well he actually gives us a clue in the way he puts it: "Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God." The clue is this: to know what it means, first look at how God loves us. "God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him." That sounds easy enough doesn't it? God loved us by sending his Son to live among us. Nothing unusual about that. All of us are born into the world the way Jesus was. So how does that show love? Well, of course we know, don't we, that even if Jesus was born the way we were, his birth was a lot different. It's what he was before that makes it such a remarkable example of love. We're told in Philippians 2 that though he was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited or hung onto, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death-- even death on a cross. This is what John has in mind as he thinks about God's love for us.
	This Christmas event wasn't just the coming of Jesus into the world. It also entailed him throwing off all the glory he had in the Father's Kingdom; all for us; and it also entailed the Easter event as well, his suffering and death on our behalf.
	It's a great tradition to listen to the Messiah at Christmas time isn't it? Did any of you go to see it the week before last? Or listened to it on a CD? Well, even though we listen to it at Christmas, the Messiah is about Easter as much as it's about Christmas, and that's because Christmas gains its meaning only because of the Easter event. Jesus was born on earth just so he could die. To love the way God loves is to be willing to give up our life for the sake of the one we love.
	Let me tell you a story that illustrates something about this sort of love. It's a true story, about a German artist named Albrecht Durer and one of his famous drawings, "The Praying Hands."
	Durer's Father was a goldsmith and apprenticed him in his early years to learn the family trade, but Durer loved painting and really wanted to be a painter. So his father finally gave in and agreed that he could go to Nuremberg to study art. Unfortunately though, his father wasn't wealthy enough to support him, so he had to work as a labourer to support himself. The trouble was, this left him little time to work on his art. Now he had a friend, Franz Knigstein who was also a gifted artist and in the same boat, so they decided that they'd draw lots and one would support the other while he finished his studies and then he'd support the other out of his earnings as an artist. Well, they drew lots and Albrecht won. So Albrecht was able to devote himself to his art studies, but he agreed to support Franz after achieving success so his friend could finish his studies. Some years later Albrecht returned to find Franz so he could keep his end of the bargain. But when he got there he discovered what a sacrifice his friend had made for him.
	You see as Franz had worked at his labour, his fingers had become twisted and stiff. His long, slender fingers and sensitive hands had been ruined for life. He could no longer manage the delicate brush strokes so necessary for executing fine paintings. But in spite of the price he had paid, Franz wasn't bitter. He was happy that his friend Albrecht had attained success.
	Well, one day Albrecht saw his friend kneeling, his rough hands entwined in silent prayer. Albrecht quickly sketched the hands, later using the sketch to create this drawing "The Praying Hands". He saw his friend's hands as a symbol of the sort of love that Jesus had shown us. A self giving love that preferred the good of the loved one to its own rights. A self emptying love that chose servanthood over equality with God and the glory of heaven.
	But there's a second aspect to love that I want to mention today. It comes out in v10: "In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins."
	Most of the time, I think, we love people who love us. That is, our love is a response to other people's love. Or worse still we love for what we get out of it. So we love the people who give us positive affirmation. We love those who tell us how good we are. But God's love is of a type that requires no external stimulus. He loved not because we first loved him, but simply because he loved us. His love arose out of his own nature. And he showed his love for us by sending his son to die for us, - even while we were still his enemies, we're told in Romans 5. The sort of love Albrecht Durer's friend showed, as great as it was, was still love for a friend. But Jesus shows his love for us by coming as a little baby to live and die for the sake of those who were his enemies. He came to make it possible for us to become his friends, even though he knew that many of his own people would reject him.
	So the challenge for us is to love with God's love. That is, to initiate love for all people irrespective of whether we find them lovable or not. To love with a sacrificial love that gives without looking for a return.
	And what will the result of this sort of love be? Well, John tells us in v12: "No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us." You see it's all very well for us to celebrate Christmas. We can shout from the rooftops that Jesus has come. We can try to tell people that Christmas isn't about Santa Claus. But how do we convince them. No-one has ever seen God. No-one alive today has even seen Jesus. So how can we convince them of the truth about him. John says, by showing them the next best thing. If you can't show them God or Jesus, at least show them the love of God. The way to do that is to make sure that we love one another, because then people will see God living in us and his love being made complete in us. This is a very contemporary message isn't it? What people want to see today is authentic Christian lives. They want to see God living in us. They don't want to hear our words about God, they want to see those words made real in the way we live; in the way we love one another.
	What does Christmas mean to you today? Does it mean spending time with your family? Does it mean sweating over a hot stove? Does it mean putting up with relatives you haven't seen since last Christmas and it's a good thing Christmas only comes once a year!? Does it mean unwrapping all those interesting parcels under the tree? Or does it mean the ultimate expression of God's love shown in the coming of his only Son to be the sacrifice that takes away our sins. And does that love inspire you to show the same love to others? To love those relatives of yours even if they do get on your nerves. To love your next door neighbour, or the person you work with who's such a pain in the neck. To love those people both here and in other parts of the world who have less than they need to live. This is love the way God loves. To love without reward, unconditionally, sacrificially.
	May our hearts overflow this Christmas with God's love, that all people may see God in us to the praise of his glorious name. Amen.

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