At Christmas, many are now thinking about Jesus coming into the world. Not just the fact that he came, but the reason for his coming. It is a matter worth considering: why did Jesus come?
If you want to see a bunch of the reasons the Bible gives for why Jesus came, you can read this old post of mine here. There are a lot of reasons the Bible gives for why Jesus came.
But among them is the fact that Jesus came to bring us rest. Matthew 11:28 is pretty clear:
Come to me, all who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Jesus came to bring us rest. He calls us to come to him for the purpose of rest.
Which, when you think about the state of many of our Christmases in the church (something it always bears saying is not demanded of us nor is it in the Bible), doesn’t seem to be on display. It seems for many of us, Christmas and rest are in no way synonymous. Christmas, if anything, is among the busiest times of year.
Which begs the question, if Jesus came to bring us rest and Christmas seems to make us as busy as it gets all year, might we be doing it a bit wrong?