Extreme Makeover - A Christmas Eve Message...Continued from page 3

John A. Huffman, Jr.

Frederick Buechner, in his book titled Listening to Your Life, wrote:

When the child was born, the whole course of human history was changed. That is a truth that is as unassailable as any truth. Art, music, literature, western culture itself, with all its institutions and western man's whole understanding of himself and his world. It is impossible to conceive how differently things would have turned out if that birth had not happened, whenever, wherever, however it did. And there is a truth beyond that for millions of people who have believed since. The birth of Jesus made possible not just a new way of understanding life, but a new way of living it. The truth of this incarnation should never cease to amaze us. The mystery of the eternal, cradled in a manger, elicits awesome wonder and grateful praise.

God, since the very time of Adam and Eve, has reached out to all humankind. The Old Testament gives record to it as the prophets foretold the coming of the Savior of the world. All through human history, up until that night in Bethlehem, men, women and children have, in anticipation of that coming, experienced this extreme makeover. And it has been happening ever since that night since Jesus came.

I could walk around this sanctuary with a roving mike and have person after person stand up and describe their experience with eternal life, spiritual rebirth, salvation, forgiveness, new creation, reconciliation.

Let me tell you just one brief story. One of the toughest guys in the Nixon White House was a man by the name of Chuck Colson: New Englander, Ivy-League trained, a tough Marine. He was the president's lawyer. He had a sign on his door: "I'd walk over my own grandmother to re-elect Richard Nixon." There were those who, during the terrible months of the Watergate inquisition, were convinced that Chuck Colson was behind it all. Colson himself was deeply troubled as he watch the administration he had given his life to come crumbling down around him. Searching for some kind of help, he talked with his friend, Tom Phillips, the CEO at Raytheon. Phillips told him about how Jesus Christ had transformed his life and could do the same thing for Colson.

Colson didn't believe it. Nonetheless, he took the little book, Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis, that Phillips had given him and, in the dark momen

t of his soul, began to read through it. God spoke to him. Colson realized his need and, intellect that he was, faith did not come easy. Cynical lawyer that he was, he didn't want to be spiritually gullible. But then, in the extremity of his need, he finally opened his heart to God and admitted he was a sinner. He repented of that sin and put his trust in Jesus Christ alone for salvation. Chuck Colson received God's promised eternal life. He was born again. He experienced salvation, forgiveness of sins. He understood what it was to be a new creation in Christ. He was reconciled with the Father.