Jesus is the Better Savior | Hebrews 13:5-9
How many of you live in fear? What are you afraid of? Heights, spiders, snakes, flying, dentists, drones or death? We live in a world full of fear. In the Christmas classic, Home Alone (1990), Kevin McCallister is an eight-year-old left by his parents at home on accident while they travel to Paris for Christmas. The movie is the story of how he navigated being alone, defended his house from the wet bandits and overcame his fears of old man Marley, who his brother Buzz told him was a murderer who kills people with a snow shovel. There is an iconic part of the movie where Kevin decides he’s not afraid anymore and he goes outside and yells that he’s not afraid anymore. He wasn’t afraid until he faces old man Marley and then he runs away screaming. I feel like that is how a lot of us are with our fears. We tell ourselves we are not afraid, but when we face to face with our deepest fears, we run away screaming. But what if I told you, you don’t have to be afraid anymore? That’s the message of Christmas. God did not send an Angel, an economist, an attorney, a politician or scientist; He sent a Savior. We don’t have to be afraid because we have a Savior who came to rescue us from our deepest fears and defeat them forever.
The message of Christmas was first given to the Shepherds; the least likely to receive the news that the Savior was born. The message of “Fear Not” is the good news of the Gospel. No other religion teaches us to not be afraid like Christianity. The writer of the book of Hebrews is writing to show us that Jesus is better than anything or anyone. Whatever you are looking to, to save you, Jesus is better. The message of Christmas is that Jesus became a human to save humanity by defeating the devil and delivering us from the fear of death.