The story of the nativity is certainly an amazing story. Even if you took out the supernatural aspects, just the facts of the narrative itself would make a great movie. You have an evil king (and Herod was really, really evil). You have a simple peasant couple, engaged to each other, having to make a long trip. She’s pregnant, but not by him. He cares for her anyway, because he loves her and because he’s a righteous man. They arrive at their destination but can’t find a place to stay. All of the hotels are booked. So, they slept that night where the livestock slept and the baby was born in a manger, a feeding trough for the animals likely dug out of a piece of limestone rock. Then at some point later, the evil king gets jealous and tries the kill the new baby king, but they escape in the dark of night. Finally, the baby grows up to be a great teacher who impacts all of the world.
But there is a supernatural element to this story, and that makes all of the difference. I was talking recently to someone who asked why I believed in God. I gave him my reasons and asked him to consider them himself. Then I told him, “In the end, you have to do something with Jesus. Was Jesus the Son of God, God in the flesh, or wasn’t he?” And it is that point that turns this tale from a predictable, made-for-TV movie into the story that changes the world.
You see, this story was not simply about a baby born to an immigrant, homeless couple. This baby was the Son of God, God in the flesh. The angel told Joseph, Jesus’ earthly father, as it were, that the baby inside of Mary (and make no mistake, there was an actual baby inside of Mary’s womb—it was not a clump of cells; to save her reputation, Mary could have had an abortion) was not due to intercourse with a man, but through the Holy Spirit. Jesus’ mother was Mary, but his father was (is) God.
But you’ve got to keep the supernatural element in this story. Without it, this is just a rags-to-riches story of a hometown boy made good. But when you reckon with the fact that this baby was fully God and fully man, . . . well, that changes everything. At that point, you lose the privilege of dismissing this story. As I told my friend, you’ve got to do something with this Jesus, this baby that was born of a virgin and conceived by the Holy Spirit.
Listen to what the Apostle Paul said about Jesus. “In him (that is, in Jesus), all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (Col. 1:19). Think about that. In that baby, lying in that manger, nursing at Mary’s breasts, toddling around Joseph’s carpenter shop, was all that God is, the “fullness of God.” Elsewhere Paul says that Jesus is the image of the invisible God. God is invisible, but we can see him in Jesus. Paul goes as far as to say that in Jesus the whole fulness of deity dwells bodily. Jesus was the incarnation of God. All of who God is was in that baby. Even putting it like that doesn’t say it correctly. God did not reside in Jesus’ body the way that we, say, reside in a house. This Jesus, this baby born of Mary, sung about by the angels, worshipped by the shepherds, visited by the wise men, was no normal baby. This was God. He was God in the flesh, fully God and fully a man.
The prophet Isaiah said that Jesus shall be called Immanuel, which means “God with us.” The birth of Jesus, as God in the flesh, means that God has come to us. God is not distant; he is near to us. He is with us and close to us. God saw us in our helplessness, and Jesus said, “I will go and save them, even if it means limiting myself to a human body.” And he did. This baby would not grow up to simply be a great teacher or even a martyr dying for a great cause. He would grow up as God incarnate, doing things only God could do, and then dying sinless for the sins of his people.
As you celebrate Christmas this year, please go beyond the packages and the parties, go beyond the warmth of family and traditions, even go beyond a baby born of a peasant couple in a stable 2000 years ago. Find your hope and joy in the fact that this baby was God incarnate, God in the flesh, come to save you from your sins.