Christmas and your boss

Christmas has everything to do with your relationships-not just the ones with your spouse and your children, or even with your neighbors. Christmas has everything to do with how you relate to difficult and unreasonable people, such as maybe a Scrooge-like boss.

Christmas says that God kept His promise-and because of that, you can keep yours. God's promise is that as a result of the obedience of the one Man-Jesus-that one Man was placed in a position above all principalities and powers and rulers of the air. You can read about it in Paul's letter to the Ephesians.

In chapter 1 of that letter, Paul talks about "every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places." Those blessings are ours now, not just in the by and by. That's because, as Paul says in chapter 2, those who follow Christ have a seat of authority with Him "in the heavenly places."

That's a lot of authority. The rest of Paul's letter goes into some detail. He wants you and me to know-as he says in chapter 1, verse 19 - that there is "the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe." And, he says a verse later, it is the same kind and quality of power that raised Jesus from the dead.

The point is, that it is enough power even to love an unreasonable boss. Even to love the irascible Scrooge, not just the Scrooge at the end of the story.

Sometime this Christmas season, you'll probably hear the song, "Joy to the World." When you do, listen carefully for this lyric about the work of Jesus Christ: "He comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found."

The gospel tells us that God has removed the curse that gets in the way of you loving unlovable people. Hard-heartedness, resentment, and bitterness don't have to be your default mode. But it's like a man once told me about cars. You may have a car worthy of the Utah Salt Flats Racing Association's 130 MPH Club. But if you never try it out, you will never know. You may as well have my '96 Buick Century.

In Jesus Christ, the power to trounce any temptation Satan throws at you is available. The Lord can make His blessings flow into every relationship you have-even those with the most difficult of people.

Think of that as your Christmas present from the Lord. In the words of Tiny Tim, it is a gift through which God can truly "bless us all, every one."