A Gospel for Sinners

"Now when they had testified and spoken the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans." (Acts 8:25 ESV)

Christmas celebrations often emphasize sentimentality—the innocence of the baby, the wonder of the star, the humility of the stable. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, however, insisted that we must never separate Christ's birth from its purpose. The manger points inevitably to the cross.

In this passage, Peter and John preach "the gospel"—literally, the good news—to Samaritan villages. Lloyd-Jones emphasizes that what makes this news genuinely good is that it addresses humanity's fundamental problem: sin. The Christmas message remains incomplete without understanding why incarnation was necessary.

Lloyd-Jones observes that modern sensibilities often recoil from talk of sin, preferring more palatable topics like love and peace. Yet the biblical narrative insists that Christ came precisely because humanity stood alienated from God through willful rebellion. The miracle of Christmas is not merely that God became man, but that He did so to reconcile sinners to Himself.

The gospel preached to those Samaritan villages would have included the shocking truth that the infant born in Bethlehem was destined for crucifixion. His birth in humble circumstances foreshadowed His humiliation on the cross. The swaddling cloths anticipated His burial garments. The gifts of the magi—particularly the myrrh—pointed to His sacrificial death.

Lloyd-Jones reminds us that the incarnation demonstrates both God's holiness and His love. His holiness requires judgment against sin; His love provides the substitute to bear that judgment. Christmas and Easter stand inseparably connected—the cradle and the cross represent two aspects of a single redemptive work.

Those Samaritan villages—long excluded from traditional Jewish worship—received the gospel with joy because it offered what they desperately needed: reconciliation with God. The same message that brought hope to first-century Samaritans brings hope to twenty-first-century sinners. Christ came for those who recognize their need.

This Christmas, resist the temptation to domesticate the incarnation into merely a heartwarming story. The infant in the manger is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. His birth announces not just divine presence but divine purpose—to seek and save the lost.

The gospel remains "the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes" (Romans 1:16). The true wonder of Christmas lies not merely in a baby's birth but in its purpose: God became man so that sinners might be reconciled to God. This is news worth celebrating, news worth sharing, news worth believing.