Introduction
Several years ago, my dad wrote a wonderful devotional entitled The Gold That Washed Ashore (now out of print). Dad was old-school in his writing and preaching, crafting sermons of homiletic eloquence, and his devotionals were no exception. This is one of his great devotionals, combined with some of my thoughts. The title of today’s post is:
He Came
“For today in the city of David, there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:11 NASB)
“For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
(Luke 19:10 NASB)
Dutch Shares
When Christ came to earth, it was not as most expected. The religious world had overlooked the prophecy regarding a virgin conceiving (Isaiah 7:14); perhaps they simply had a different interpretation of the verse, since it was considered a total impossibility. At any rate, the birth of Christ through a poor, teenage virgin - from the other side of the tracks, Nazareth, of all places - wasn’t on the list of Messianic expectations. Nor was a manger (a feeding trough) for a crib, in a smelly, dung-filled stable. The scribes, Pharisees, and religious elite were confident the Messiah would be regal, wealthy, and come from their ranks, of course.
You must admit, the Christmas story does strain the imagination. It is not so difficult to conceive of God coming to earth to rescue fallen humanity. But becoming a microscopic seed, placed in the womb of a teenage girl, fed by a cord from her placenta, and entering the world through a narrow birth canal is an entirely different story. It seems ridiculous, and certainly sacrilegious, to think of God in dirty diapers, burping, and crying for Mama. I can easily conceive of Him walking on water, but not of falling when learning to walk. Feeding the 5000 - no problem, but smearing food all over His face when learning to feed Himself? That’s a bit of a stretch. He was, after all, God.
But to keep Christ from being truly human not only disqualifies Him from being our Savior, but it also misses God’s heart and message. Christ loved us enough to become one of us. Our Lord’s most common name for Himself was Son of Man. He chose to experience our humanness, feel our pain and hunger, wrestle with the wound of rejection, and know the disappointment of loss. His calloused hands knew hard work, His feet walked hundreds of miles, and He slept many nights on the ground. Jesus had to become human in order to bleed, die, and redeem us; and so He did. Let Him be one of us, and let Him into the muck and mire of our world. Dad speaks eloquently of Christ’s coming and of His redeeming purpose.
From Dad
“From Genesis to Revelation, there is a great scarlet thread of truth calling our attention to a coming Redeemer. This hope of a coming Redeemer was the secret of Abel offering a more excellent sacrifice than Cain’s. It was the only light that gleamed in the ark as it rolled over the waves of an ocean world. This hope guided the patriarchs and gladdened the prophets. Then…the Great Redeemer came.
“He came, and was a great preacher. All the preachers of the centuries look small when we line them alongside the Man whose hands were calloused by a carpenter's plane and who wore the peasant smock of Galilee. He came, and was the greatest physician the world has ever seen. He was the world’s sympathetic friend in a world of pain. He came, and was the perfect example.
“Yet, He came to be more than a great preacher, physician, or pattern. He came to be our Savior. He came to deal with the thing that drenched the world with blood, that bleached it with bones, and that filled the air with moans and groans. He came to bridge the gulf that separates humanity from God. He came to shut the very jaws of damnation and throw open the gates of gold. He came to fix us so we could appear as if the archer of hell never shot us through.
“All the sins of all His people were gathered upon His shoulders. The heart of Christ became like a reservoir in the mountains, and all the tributary streams of iniquity ran down and gathered into that vast lake. Sin wrote its vicious history with the scourge, thorns, nails, spear, and throbbing agony - our sins, yours and mine. At Calvary, we see the wrath of God against sin inscribed in characters of blood, and we see sin's absolution: ‘Father, forgive them.’ (Luke 23:34)
“We used to sing the great hymn:
Oh, Now I See the Crimson Wave
“‘Oh, now I see the crimson wave, the fountain deep and wide;
‘Jesus, my Lord, mighty to save, points to His wounded side.
‘I see the new creation rise, I hear the speaking blood;
It speaks! Polluted nature dies! Sinks 'neath the cleansing flood.
‘The cleansing stream I see, I see! I plunge and, oh, it cleanseth me!
‘Oh, praise the Lord, it cleanseth me! It cleanseth me, yes, cleanseth me!’”(1)
“Thank You, Jesus, for coming!”
Pray with me:
Father, we thank You for sending Your Son, Jesus, as Heaven’s great gift. Thank You for the incarnation, Christ’s humble birth, and His substitutionary death. Thank You for the cleansing stream that flows from Him still.
Jesus, You came. As we celebrate Your birth, we thank You for the humbling journey You made…for the sacrifices, the miles, the sleepless nights, and the tears. Thank You for the blood You shed, the stripes You bore, the crown of thorns You wore, the nails and the spear that pierced Your holy body.
Holy Spirit, as we celebrate Christmas this year, remind us to celebrate our Redeemer as He should be celebrated, and love Him as He should be loved.
And in closing, Father, we remember to pray against the plans of terrorists who have entered our nation. Jesus taught us to ask for deliverance from evil (Matthew 6:13). We do so now. Please expose the terrorists in our land. Give those who search for them breakthrough and unprecedented skill. We ask that You give President Trump and those working with him great wisdom and strategy. Break the back of radical Islam here and throughout the world. All of these things we pray in the mighty name of Yeshua.
Our decree:
We declare our faith that the cleansing stream of Christ still flows today, cleansing us from all sin and unrighteousness.
Have a wonderful Christmas this year, celebrating Him!
Click on the link below to watch the full video.