The Birth of a Savior

Is it hard for you to maintain focus on the meaning of Christmas during all the hustle and bustle of Christmas? It is for me. But one of the things I always do this time of year is re-read Philip Yancey's The Jesus I Never Knew, specifically his chapter on Jesus' birth. I am so thankful to have grown up with in a Christian family which brought me to church. One of the drawbacks, however, is that I have heard the Bible stories so often that sometimes I don't think about what I read. Yancey's book helps me maintain my focus on the Gospel though. In his chapter on the birth of Christ Yancey writes:

"Today as I read the accounts of Jesus' birth I tremble to think of the fate of the world resting on the responses of two rural teenagers. How many times did Mary review the angel's words as she felt the Son of God kicking against the walls of her uterus? How many times did Joseph second-guess his own encounter with an angel as he endured the hot shame of living among villagers who could plainly see the changing shape of his fiancee?

"Nine months of awkward explanations, the lingering scent of scandal - it seems that God arranged the most humiliating circumstances possible for his entrance, as if to avoid any charge of favoritism. I am impressed that when the Son of God became a human being he played by the rules, harsh rules: small towns do not treat kindly young boys who grow up with questionable paternity.

"Malcolm Muggeridge observed that in our day, with family-planning clinics offering convenient ways to correct 'mistakes' that might disgrace a family name, 'It is, in point of fact extremely improbable, under existing conditions, that Jesus would have been permitted to be born at all. Mary's pregnancy, in poor circumstances, and with the father unknown, would have been an obvious case for an abortion... Thus our generation, needing a Savior more, perhaps, than any that has ever existed, would be too humane to allow one to be born.'

"The virgin Mary, though whose parenthood was unplanned, had a different response... Often a work of God comes with two edges, great joy and great pain... Mary embraced both. She was the first person to accept Jesus on his own terms, regardless of the personal cost."

May this advent season be one that we may connect with Jesus, enrich our faith, show His grace and mercy to others, and await His return.