I can remember going into a room where the lights were off. I was taking a test for my emergency training certification and they wanted us to experience a room with smoke. A room with smoke is basically a room without lights. You can barely see anything. It was hard to know what I was tripping over or feeling as I crawled through the room. Only when the lights were turned on did I see we were in an office with tables and chairs turned over and a victim who needed our help. The reality of the situation made more sense when I could see it. It was very difficult to figure out what was going on around me when I entered a dark room and could not see anything.

We are reminded in our text today of the following reality. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. 15 (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ ”) 16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known. John 1:14–18 (NIV)

Imagine reading the Bible without reading or knowing the Christmas and Easter story. Jesus is the light to our lives and yet many days we live our lives forgetting the message of Christ and the angels who serve him. We live our lives as if we are alone. Yet the word became real and put on flesh. We can choose to believe and let the words of John remind us that there is more to this life we live or we can choose to wake up each day to only fulfill the tasks of life before us. My prayer is that the Christmas story changes the way you see the world. May the words of John transform your life. May the life Jesus lived live in you.

Pastor Aaron