'Tis the Season to be Jolly!

For many, the reason to be "jolly" involves little more than a season of giving and receiving gifts.  But, for Christians,  the reason for happiness, laughter and smiles involves much more than feelings...the reason for our happiness is the grace of God. 
For the past 10 years I have been reading the book God With Us: The Miracle of Christmas, during the month of December.  My favorite chapter is entitled "Knots on the Family Tree".  This chapter details the lives of the four women mentioned in the geneology of Jesus; Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba.  As I look at the background of these women I marvel at God's grace towards us.  Listen to the words of the author, "What a geneology Matthew gives us!  It's almost as if he is nominating people for a Hall of Shame." 
In these stories we find women with broken lives, broken relationships, broken hearts...not uncommon to many of the people we come into contact with everyday.  But, we are reminded in this geneology that it is not the perfect lives of individuals that are on display, but God's grace and mercy for fallen man.  After all this is the heart of the Christmas story: "God in His mercy doing for sinners what they cannot do for themselves - mending broken lives and restoring shattered hopes.  That's why He came - to save His people from their sins (Matt. 1:21)"
Have a holly, jolly, Christmas!