Logos Staff
In the book 300 Christmas Quotations and Prayers, editor Elliot Ritzema pulls from centuries of Christian writing to offer timeless yet fresh reflections on Advent and Christmas.
Here are just three quotes.
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“Unless He were true God, He would not bring us a remedy; unless He were true man, He would not give us an example.”
— Leo the Great (ca. 400–461)
“In the Little One there has appeared grace for our instruction, because He will yet be great, as the angel Gabriel foretold. And they whom He, as a Little One, shall have instructed in humility and meekness of heart, He will afterwards exalt and glorify, when He shall come as great and glorious, Jesus Christ our Lord forever.”
— Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153)
“If the birth of Jesus was so gladsome to our cousins the angels, what should it be to us? If it made our neighbors sing who had comparatively so small a share in it, how should it make us leap for joy? Oh, if it brought heaven down to earth, should not our songs go up to heaven? If heaven’s gate of pearl was set open at its widest, and a stream of shining ones came running downward to the lower skies, to anticipate the time when they shall all descend in solemn pomp at the glorious advent of the great King; if it emptied heaven for a while to make earth so glad, ought not our thoughts and praises and all our loves to go pouring up to the eternal gate, leaving earth a while that we may crowd heaven with the songs of mortal men?”
— Charles Spurgeon (1834–1892)
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Timothy Muehlhoff
