December 21

Luke 2:10

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

The birth of Christ was the watershed of history. Earthly time and eternity are divided and measured by His birth; B.C is before Christ, and A.D. is after Christ, Anno Domini, or Year of our Lord. When the angel announced to the shepherds that the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End, THE MIGHTY GOD WAS STEPPING OUT OF ETERNITY INTO TIME, it was good tidings of great joy indeed. In this little babe were met “The hopes and fears of all the years” as the hymn says. The good tidings of great joy is the Gospel, or GOOD NEWS, that our Savior came into this world, took on Himself the form of a man, and allowed Himself to be placed on the cross of Calvary to suffer and die as the punishment which OUR sins deserved; to die in OUR PLACE so that all that accept and believe on Him might have eternal life. These are good tidings indeed!

Commentary by Francis L. Harris

"...what must I do to be saved?" Acts 16:30