Christmas is a beautiful opportunity to remind Christians the Savior of the world was sent in the form of an inconvenient pregnancy. God has a plan for every life He creates, no matter the circumstances of pregnancy. Pastors, teachers, and Christian leaders can take this season of celebration to strengthen Christian understanding of God’s priority for life.
Make room in your Christmas messages Christians familiar with Christmas know there was “no room in the Inn” for Mary to birth Jesus. Our current cultural moment urges us to highlight how there was “no room” in the plans of Mary and Joseph for their shocking pregnancy. The Savior of the world was sent as a troublesome surprise- Mary was a teenager. Joseph was poor, seeking to be pious, and saw no path forward to be a father. The couple had wedding plans to keep and a family to honor. The good news of Christmas was not originally good news at all. 56% of Christians surveyed say they want their leaders to make room in their teaching to educate the Church about abortion. The Christmas season is a gift to make room in messages to celebrate God’s priority and purpose for every life. God sent angels as messengers to Mary and Joseph to inform them of His sovereign plan for their unplanned pregnancy. Today God sends you with the same message- God is sovereign over all of life and He has a purpose for every life. We must make room for this truth in our Christmas messages. Connect God’s heart with the heart of your people and this cultural moment God’s word reframes the reality of surprise pregnancies. Upon hearing God’s messengers speak God’s word, Mary’s troubled spirit was transformed into tremendous faith (Luke 1:26-38) and Joseph’s desire for divorce was converted to determination for obedience (Matthew 1:18-25). God’s messengers must speak God’s word to redemptively reframe today’s cultural moment. The Christmas story has at least four connections for God’s people to connect with current cultural conversations about life: -God is working in the lives of babies in wombs. When Mary greets her relative Elizabeth, we are told Elizabeth’s “baby leaped in her womb! And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.” (Luke 1:39-45) We normally celebrate the intimate handiwork of God working in the womb by quoting Psalm 139:13-16, but we do not normally make this connection to the Christmas season. God is weaving together potential worshippers in the wombs of women! -Men must rise to the moment. God’s commitment to Joseph led him to remain committed to Mary and her child. Joseph refused to have Mary stoned, and he refused to leave her alone. Godly men are essential for a flourishing family, and family is the fabric of a strong society. Christmas is a counter narrative calling men to step into, not away from, the uncertainties of surprise pregnancies. Fathers must be present and engaged. All men, not just fathers, must raise their hands to mentor other men who are surprised to be fathers. God’s commitment to His people must lead us to deepen our commitment in marriage, family, mentoring, and serving to ensure surprise pregnancies develop and give birth to an abundant life. -Family is essential for strength in the struggle. Mary’s visit to see her relative Elizabeth transformed her struggle into song. The Church is God’s family sent to strengthen people weighing options of what to do with a surprise pregnancy, to walk alongside them and sustain life. This is a Christmas connection for every Christian, giving purpose to every person touched by God’s love. Jesus invites little children to come to Him. So too the family of God must drop our arguments and open our arms to welcome and support life, strengthening women and supporting vulnerable children and families. This looks like support in the foster care space, adoption, mentoring moms, or meeting other relational needs of your local pregnancy care center. Christians are the family of God, and the strength of God’s love through His people can and will transform the struggle of surprise pregnancies into joyful songs of praise. -Love is the ultimate game changer. Rebecca Mclaughlin rightly said, “To solve the problem of abortion, we don’t just need one law reversed. We need a loving revolution.” Christmas is a crystal-clear picture of God’s love for the world, God inconvenienced Himself for believers to have abundant life. Christians must connect God’s love for the world with His call for Christians to likewise love our neighbors through supporting women, men, and children struggling to survive a pregnancy surprise. Love will win the war for life when we as Christians inconvenience ourselves to support life, everywhere, and for everyone. Give the gift your Church really needs About 45% of pregnancies occurring in the US are conceived accidentally. Tragically, 40% of these unplanned children are rejected by their parents through abortion. And even more are personally touched by abortion in other ways. Almost 20% of Christians admit to having paid for, encouraged, or chosen to have an abortion. This means more of our Christian family than we realize are personally touched by the issue, almost 1 in 5 of the people coming to your church this Christmas season (not including the countless others wrestling with the conflict of ideas in our culture surrounding life issues). Life is a Jesus issue, not a political issue. Christians want to know Jesus’s perspective on and purposes for surprise pregnancies. Connecting the Christmas story with our current struggle for life will empower and encourage Christians asking for you to help them think Christianly about being pro-life. Take a moment to make the connections between Christmas and God’s sovereign plan for all of life. Avoid trite. Speak triumphantly. The same power from God’s promises that embolden Mary and Joseph is the same power for believers today. “Nothing is impossible for God!” (Luke 1:37) So believers must lean into this opportunity by speaking triumphantly. It is both inaccurate and simplistic to say that if abortion as we know it existed in Mary’s day then there would be no Christmas. Infanticide was a reality in ancient Rome. Mary and Joseph had options. Trite and pithy messages will not take ground in the human heart. Uncompromising conviction begins and ends with God’s sovereign plan and purpose for every human life. All people are created in His image (Genesis 1:27), knit together by God Himself (Psalm 139:13-16). Jesus is the Author of Life (Acts 3:15) and every child has a right to life. Today Christians must lean into God’s sovereign grace by stewarding the Christmas season as an opportunity to make room in our messages to triumphantly celebrate God’s priority and purpose for every life. "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons." Galatians 4:4–5
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