Read: John 3:16

Christmas is wet in Singapore. It doesn’t snow; it rains. Growing up in a non-Christian family, we didn’t celebrate Christmas. But when I was young, my siblings and I, together with a few neighborhood kids, decided to have a Christmas gift exchange. I don’t know where we got the idea—maybe from all the TV shows we’d been watching. We put our names into a bag, and each of us picked the name of someone to buy a present for. Some of us were happy with the gifts we received, some of us were not; but we were all glad to have received presents.

We didn’t realize the perfect gift had been given to us 2,000 years ago by God our Creator. The Bible tells us, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son” (JOHN 3:16). When I was a teenager, I heard about this gift and accepted Jesus as my Savior.

I remember celebrating my first Christmas as a believer in Christ. Christmas was special now because I finally understood it’s meaning—it’s a celebration of God’s perfect gift, Jesus Christ. I realized that God is not a mystical force out there; He is a personal God who loves people of all nations and socioeconomic classes. And this personal God expressed His love for me by dying for me.

During this festive season—and always—may we continue to fix our eyes on the Christ of Christmas. —POH FANG CHIA

At Bethlehem, God demonstrated that to love is to give.

Tell us your thoughts› Share your comments with us at asiapacific@odb.org.