Day 27 ( children)

I've been very impressed this year by how many churches and charities and organisations are going out of their way to give Christmas to the poor.   There is a cafe in Belfast which is opening to give a free Christmas lunch to fifteen people on Sunday.  Our own church is doing the same and has also given out over 200 hampers this year.  In the next town a charity is busy giving presents to children

Hampers ( boxes) of food and gifts donated
 by our  church this year 

who are not going to have much of a Christmas this year - it is very heartening to know that in the midst of the getting and spending people do care and are thinking about how to practically reach out to the marginalised and vulnerable in society.

Today I dropped off a couple of Christmas puddings to a charity which was asking for the last few items on a shopping list of things for families who would otherwise not be having Christmas dinner on Sunday.  Ben asked what I was doing and why, so I tried to explain.  But when you are 11 and you have always had Christmas it is hard to imagine how difficult things must be for anyone not to be able to afford it.   I think back to my own childhood, when my parents had divorced and my Mother was working all the hours she could just to put food on the table.  We had nothing.  Not that we realised that as children really.  But looking back now I can see how hard Mum struggled to give us a good Christmas - saving up all year and doubtless going without lots of things she would have liked herself just so my brother and I would not be disappointed.   Im sure she felt it was worth the effort on Christmas Day when we were happy and amazed at the things Santa had left for us.  Just as I will feel it is worth the effort on Sunday - because I just want my kids to be delighted.  

It seems to be hard wired into us as human beings that we put our kids first.  Not just when they are tiny helpless infants, but as they grow to adulthood too.  We will sacrifice and spend and taxi and serve and nurse and discipline - not just so that they will turn out to be confident, happy, well adjusted individuals who can cope in the world, but because doing those things actually makes us happy as parents.  Or as adults involved in a child's life.  Meeting the needs of children fulfils something in us.  And when we see children in need we are moved to respond.

All of which makes it all the more remarkable that God, the Father of all fathers, the essence of love, the heart of compassion and kindness and mercy, chose to hand over His one and only Son and see Him born into poverty.  See Him struggle as a refugee and live under the rule of an occupying army.  Watch Him grow up as a humble carpenter, facing the daily dangers of injury and illness and accident.   How often would the heart of the Father have longed to step in and provide for His Son - especially at the end of His life ?  When the angels were straining to go and rescue Jesus and He Himself was pleading  ' Let this cup pass me by'    If that was your son pleading what would you have done??

If we love children how much more does God love His own Son?  And yet He set aside that overwhelming overpowering love in favour of you.   He loved you more.  He loved you so much that He was prepared to see His own Son crucified so that you could know Him.   It is hard to think about isnt it?    This Christmas as we watch small people delighting in gifts and enjoying the results of all the hard work and time and money we have put in let us remember the God who spent so much more so that we could have peace, joy and eternal life.  And let us be more thankful than we have ever been.