The Gift that Money Can’t Buy
We recently watched an old Macaulay Culkin film, not ‘Home Alone’ (though it won’t be long now!) but ‘Richie Rich’.
The richest boy in the world discovers that no matter how many billions he has in the bank, there are some things that money can’t buy, real relationship, true friendship and lasting happiness.
It’s sad to think that there are so many adults yet to learn the same lesson. No amount of money or material possessions can buy real relationship or true friendship with people, or with God. We all, like Adam, have rebelled against God. We have amassed a debt that we could never hope to repay with money or morality or even religiosity. The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23) that’s what we’ve earned! We are, by nature, dead to God. Blind to his presence and his greatness.
But there is good news!
Though we have amassed this huge debt we could never hope to repay, there is One who has come to pay it in full for us. That is what we will celebrate this Christmas, the coming of the Redeemer.
“In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us.”
Ephesians 1:7-8
It will be a different Christmas this year, but the story that sits at the centre of the season remains unchanged. Let’s resolve to remember and to rejoice that Christ came not just to stay a baby in Bethlehem. But to live a sinless life and to die a sinner’s death-in our place on the cross. That was the price of our redemption.
“You know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ.”
1 Peter 1:18-19a
It is only through Jesus Christ that we are free to have real relationship with God- to know Him and be known by Him, and therefore to know lasting joy.
How thankful we should be for Jesus, and the true riches that are ours in Him! And how eager to live our lives to the glory of God in glad and grateful response to all he has done for us and given to us in Christ Jesus.
“You were bought at a price. Therefore glorify God with your bodies.”
1 Corinthians 6:20