Dr. Randy Ruble
Ruble Brings Christmas Message To Students At Erskine Convocation
Dr. Randy Ruble, retired vice president and dean of Erskine Theological Seminary, started to head for a familiar place in the Bible when he was asked to speak at Tuesday’s Christmas Chapel at Lesesne Auditorium.
“My first inclination was to go to Luke 2, which is the traditional Christmas story,” Ruble said.
Instead, he went to a familiar verse, but didn’t give a traditional Christmas talk.
Ruble’s scripture reference was John 3:16-17: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it (NIV).”
Those verses, Ruble said, represent “good news in terms of salvation and bad news in terms of punishment.”
You can take those two verses and get to the true meaning of Christmas, he said.
John 3:16-17 primarily represent good news, Ruble said, and can be summarized in three different ideas about God.
“That he is a God of love is an incredible piece of information,” Ruble said, “considering how bad I’ve been with my life.”
He said the kind of love talked about in John 3:16 is “absolutely amazing.”
“The litmus test of God’s love is his capacity to love the unlovely,” Ruble said.
Jesus’ love for lepers and sinners is one example of the depth of God’s love.
The Apostle Paul offers as clear an understanding in human terms of what love is in 1 Corinthians 13: “Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. Love does not demand its own way. Love is not irritable, and it keeps no record of when it has been wronged. It is never glad about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.”
“A love like that, as Paul observes, will never fail,” Ruble said.
The human language cannot begin to describe the depth of God’s love, he said.
Christmas is also about giving, another lesson taught by John 3:16-17, Ruble said.
Throughout the Old Testament are examples of God’s giving nature, but his ultimate gift was when he gave his “most beloved son to the world,” he said.
“The birth of Jesus is God’s greatest gift to the world,” Ruble said.
As a child, Ruble said Christmas was mostly about receiving for him and he didn’t begin to learn until later in life that it truly is better to give than receive.
“God gave us something we should be thankful for,” Ruble said.
The third message that John 3:16-17 delivers is that not only is God a loving God, not only a giving God, but also a forgiving God, he said.
“God sent his son not to condemn the world, but to save the world,” Ruble said.
The birth of Jesus, his death on the cross and resurrection are intertwined, he said.
Ruble said, “Christmas is about God – it’s about a God who loves, a God who gives
and gives and gives, and a God who forgives.”
