It's Christmas Eve 2007 and on this morning let's you and I take a trip of remembering what it was like the first Christmas eve.  On the day before the Savior of the World would be born to a teen age mother a concerned and worried fiancée looked on.  He tries to make Mary as comfortable as possible only to find that every where he turned seemed to make thingsonly more difficult.  The Bible tells us in Luke's gospel that the roman emperor gave a decree that the entire world should be taxed. Really this was a way for the government to register those adults in each nation under their control in order to better allocate their resources.  So at the worst time possible Joseph who is still reeling from how his life has been turned upside-down now is forced to take his fiancée Mary to Bethlehem to register.  Joseph has already seen a vision of an angel who said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son and you are to give him the name Jesus. Because He will save His people from their sins."  Matthew 1:20, 21.  But now Joseph and Mary were living out the life that God had designed for them. It must have been wonderful to hear an angel speaking, but now it was up to both of them to live out God's plan and trust that He would do what He said.  On that first Christmas Eve there had to be some doubt in their minds about what the future would hold for this little baby.  They had to wonder at some point or another "Why us?"  Yet God had chosen these two lives on purpose there was something about them both that was exactly what was required to serve as the earthly parents of Jesus.  What was it; I think the answer was trust and sacrifice.  These two people who had to feel all alone in their own world put their trust in God completely and were willing to sacrifice their own understanding and their own lives in order to serve God.  They offered themselves as a gift to God. They offered their future and their fears as a sacrifice to the Son Mary carried.  Incredible devotion and amazing love for a God who was asking them to do something that no human had ever done.  It wasn't just on Christmas eve, but on everyday following that until the very end of their lives that these two would be called on by God to trust Him and to sacrifice their own understanding about how life was to work in order for God to accomplish His Plan.   When Jesus turns twelve yours old Mary and Joseph and Jesus go to a festival in Jerusalem when it was time to leave, they could not find Jesus anywhere, thinking that He may have left with a family member or friend they began to search and they found Him in the temple courts speaking with the learned men and discussing deep truth.  When Mary and Joseph asked Jesus what He was doing, Jesus calmly responds don't you know I must be about my father's work.  How would you feel knowing that God had given you the responsibility of raising His Son?  How would you feel about being misunderstood all your lives.  How would you feel about the rumors that persisted about Mary and Joseph even though they had been chosen by God for a special purpose?  They offered their lives as a gift.

"I have no gift to bring, that's fit to give a King."  These are words from the chorus of the little drummer boy.  These words describe our feelings so often when it comes to offering our lives to Jesus as a gift.  What the Lord wants most is us.  Our hearts our thoughts our lives.  Time after time the Lord has told us that we are to seek Him first, that we are to love Him with all our hearts, that we are to put our trust in Him. On this Christmas Eve, let us offer our lives as the gift that we give to God.  Let's trust Him and allow Him to lead us in the path and the plan that best glorifies Him.

Merry Christmas