Tag Archives: Christmas

Watershed Moment

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Imagine the moment the Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary, and the Son of God stepped out of the dazzling splendor of heaven into the darkness of Mary’s womb. In that mysterious moment, the genetics of God joined the genetics of Mary and all the essence of Deity began to grow. God became fully human but still fully God.

I remember my dad saying, that Jesus was “very God of very God.” I later learned that he was quoting from the Nicene Creed:

“I believe … in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.”[1]

The One who sang the stars into existence, who measured the waters of the earth in the hollow of His hand, was born human and learned to eat, to talk and to walk. Nothing is so staggering or so mysterious as the incarnation of Almighty God in human flesh. God the Father performed a spectacular miracle where no one could see, hidden in the womb of Mary.

Humanity looks down into Bethlehem’s manger, and it becomes a watershed moment – is He God or not? The believing soul is hushed kneeling in the hay before the light that shines in the darkness and gazes in wonder at the Father’s extravagant gift of love.

For all humanity and “for our salvation He came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man….”1

[1] Botefuhr, W. D. C. (1885) Nicene Creed. Fort Smith: Boetefuehr, W. D. C.

The Heartbeat of Jesus

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What’s the heartbeat and essence of Jesus? What’s His driving force?

Jesus revealed His deepest core when He said, “I am gentle and humble in heart.”[1] Gentleness and humility are His center. They are what move Him.

He humbled Himself choosing to enter the world as a helpless dependent baby in a lowly place made to shelter animals. The birth announcement was reserved for shepherds, and they were the first guests of the Christ child.

Jesus was gentle and humble kneeling before His disciples with a basin of water and a towel. His gentleness and humility were displayed in His care for the little ones and in His tears of compassion for the grieving. They’re displayed today in His tender love for me when I struggle and fail.

His heart is gentle and kind, and His arms are never crossed. They’re always open to embrace me just as I am where I am. But He also opens His arms to be embraced.

“He astounds and sustains us with His endless kindness. Only as we drink down the kindness of the heart of Christ will we leave in our wake, everywhere we go, the aroma of heaven, and die one day having startled the world with glimpses of a divine kindness too great to be boxed in by what we deserve.”

“This is the One so unspeakably brilliant that His resplendence cannot adequately be captured with words, so ineffably magnificent that all language dies away before His splendor. This is the One whose deepest heart is, more than anything else, gentle and lowly.”[2]

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.[3]

[1] Matthew 11:29

[2] Ortlund, Dane. (2020) Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers. Wheaton, IL: Crossway

[3] Matthew 11:28-29

Star Namer

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There’s a mysterious wonder that touches my soul in this season of gentle star light. My heart soars into the unfathomable mystery of the virgin birth and the inexplicable choice of the Sovereign God to make Himself nothing. The Star Namer became human to save a world writhing in the darkness of sin and bring us into His marvelous light. My stymied mind makes futile attempts to puzzle it out, but it’s absolutely mind boggling. God wove His own flesh and blood and bone together in Mary’s womb. The Eternal One was wholly dependent on the life that flowed through her vessels.

The incarnate infant Christ slept in a manger under the star of Bethlehem and under the watchful eye of His Father and multitudes of angels. What wonderous mysterious love is this?

May the wonder of Christmas capture your heart afresh.

Wonder of Wonders

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Once lit with festive Christmas lights, my neighborhood is now growing dark as lights are being taken down one yard at a time. There’s a little stab of sadness in the return to the plain and ordinary. It’s the loss of the wonder and mystery of Christmas that pains me. But I, too, will soon pack away the decorations and lights.

Wonder is so easily squelched by the routine, mundane, bizarre, and the tragic. This past year, nearly every vestige of it has been stomped out of us. But I want to keep it alive in my heart.

Wonder is the sense of awe that stirs the soul when magnificent truth beyond our capacity to comprehend is encountered. It sweeps over me when I experience the breathtaking mind-warping grandeur and majesty of God’s creation. As Job said, it causes the heart to pound and leap from its place. (Job 37:1)

I was a scuba diver in my younger days and water skied once. There’s a heart-pounding exhilaration in the spray and whipping wind as one zips over the water pulled by the power of a speeding boat, but the only wonder I experienced that day was the wonder of surviving. I much prefer the quiet depths of the water and the wonders beneath the surface.

Slipping into the depths of the holy Word of God, his Spirit stirs my heart with wonder as I ponder the breathtaking mind-warping magnificence of Truth. The greatest wonder that causes my heart to leap from its place is the unconditional, unwavering, inexhaustible love of God that embraces me just as I am in all my failures and leads me beyond them.

The Sovereign God who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name (Isaiah 40:26) died to save me from sin’s curse. Now he will never ever leave me, and every morning he calls me to follow him. Wonder of wonders.

What wondrous love is this, O my soul, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this
That caused the Lord of bliss
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul,
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul!

First Christmas

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One day out of the blue (rather, out of heaven), the angel Gabriel stood in front of a very young woman. If it weren’t enough of a shock for a tall handsome angel to appear out of nowhere, he then announced to Mary, “You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.”
She, a virgin engaged to be married, was going to become pregnant with God’s son. Questions raced through her mind. “How in the world is that supposed to happen? How am I going to explain this one, and who will believe me? This changes everything!”
After learning how the impossible was going to happen, she looked up at Gabriel and simply replied, “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me as you have said.” The angel then vanished with a smile.
In response to her absolute surrender, the mighty power of God moved upon her and the glory cloud of His Presence overshadowed her. In that private moment, heaven’s most astounding miracle materialized in secret – hidden in the womb of Mary and obscured by a cloud of glory.
Her heart was overwhelmed by the joy of His Presence and enveloped with His peace. Deity became two cells, then four cells, then eight, and soon the tiny heart of God’s Son began beating and circulating the atoning blood. All the fullness of Deity inhabited the humanity of a baby.
As the days of her pregnancy stretched on, she pondered all these things and treasured them in her heart. She keep turning the incredible message of the angel over and over in her mind – “the Most High God favors me, and I bear His Son…the King!”
While she and Joseph (who received his own personal message from the angel) were in Bethlehem to be registered for the census, the days were accomplished for her to be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. Far above the lowly stable, in the black of the night, stood a star as a bright sentinel over the King.
Mary sat in the hay tenderly cradling Jesus under the gaze of a few animals. She counted ten little fingers and ten little toes and marveled at his tiny little fingernails. She held her newborn baby boy…she held the Ancient of Days, the One who named the stars, and she looked in wonder into the eyes of her Creator – the very eyes of very God himself. And they called him Immanuel which means, “God with us.” And so, the light of the world dawned in the darkness of a stable.
The only sounds in the night were the breathing of the animals and an occasional switch of a tail. A cool breeze rustled the hay and caressed the tiny face of God then slipped out into the night whispering the miraculous birth of the King.
An ecstatic multitude of the heavenly host crowded around the portal anxious to charge through and announce the greatest news ever to be proclaimed. Gabriel gestured for silence and for some much needed angelic composure. Then he slipped through the portal and stood before a small group of astonished shepherds. The luminous angel told of the birth of their Messiah.
Meanwhile in the other realm, the angelic order was once more about to disintegrate. The angelic host couldn’t take it any longer and pushed their way through the portal. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, good will toward men.”
The stunned shepherds rushed to Bethlehem and found Joseph and Mary in the stable. The scruffy men knelt in the hay before a manger that held God incarnate, the hope of humanity. In that humble hallowed place, they worshipped their Savior and their King.
God so loved us that he opened the treasury of heaven and gave his most precious gift – his only Son wrapped in human flesh. Even now, God draws us to the cradle of his humanity and overwhelms us with the glory of His Deity. How can we not fall to our knees in worship?
For unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end.
 

The concept of ecstatic angels was taken from Gene Edwards, The Birth, the Chronicles of the Door, Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1991.
Scriptures used: Luke 1 and 2, Isaiah 9:6