_CHRISTMAS CHEER_
"_Good will toward men!_"
--LUKE ii. 8-20.
The heavens are not filled with hostility. The sky does not express a
frown. When I look up I do not contemplate a face of brass, but the face
of infinite good will. Yet when I was a child, many a picture has made me
think of God as suspicious, inhumanly watchful, always looking round the
corner to catch me at the fall. That "eye," placed in the sky of many a
picture, and placed there to represent God, filled my heart with a
chilling fear. That God was to me a magnified policeman, watching for
wrong-doers, and ever ready for the infliction of punishment. It was all a
frightful perversion of the gracious teaching of Jesus.
Heaven overflows with good will toward men! Our God not only wishes good,
He wills it! "He gave His only begotten Son," as the sacred expression of
His infinite good will. He has good will toward thee and me, and mine and
thine. Let that holy thought make our Christmas cheer.