Many times some very significant events slip under the radar and do not make the headlines. Many times it is due to the fact that the world’s eyes are fixed upon a seemingly larger event. For example, in 1809 the eyes of the world were on Napoleon as he marched across Europe. As the world watched the Napoleonic war unfolding babies were still being born and 1809 saw several men born who would make a significant impact on the world. During the course of this one year were born Oliver Wendell Holmes, Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Darwin, Kit Carson and Abraham Lincoln. The armies of Napoleon may hold a prominent place in history but it is the ideas of men like Darwin and Lincoln that have had a lasting impact on the world. In 1809 the noise of war seemed so much more significant than the cries of these newborn babies. If we journey back eighteen more centuries, we discover a similar situation. The eyes of the Mediterranean world were fixed upon Augustus Caesar and his vast empire. The headlines were dominated by the fact that Caesar had ordered census to be taken of the entire Roman world. Who could have imagined that the great Augustus was simply a tool in God’s hand for fulfilling Old Testament prophecy? Who would have noticed a young couple making the seventy mile journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem? Who would have noticed the cries of a newborn coming from a stable? Really, would anyone have cared? All eyes were fixed on Augustus Caesar and Rome allowing the most significant event in human history to go virtually unnoticed. It was during this time that the Son of God was born bringing the human race a gift that was simply indescribable.
I. Examining how God carefully unfolded His plan.
A. God determined exactly when conditions were right for Him to send His Son into the world.
1. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law. (Galatians 4:4—NIV)
2. Paul does not say what it was that marked this point in world history as the ripe moment for the incarnation of God’s Son. It is perhaps hazardous to attempt to fathom the reasons for God’s time-table, but several facts of history stand out.
3. The Romans had made this moment uniquely ready by building a network of roads and establishing a stable government. Never before had travel been so easy and safe; not again for another 1500 years would it be so.
4. The Greeks made their contribution through the universality of their language and the failure of their religion.
5. It was an age of opportunity in communication, but an age when the traditional faiths had little to communicate.
6. The Jews had made this moment in time ripe for the birth of the church by establishing synagogues throughout the known world, and by translating the Septuagint, the Old Testament Scriptures into Greek.
B. Consider all the events and circumstances surrounding Mary and Joseph.
1. Matthew in his genealogy makes it very clear that Joseph was not Jesus’ biological father while showing that Jesus was Mary’s biological son.
2. Joseph entertained the thought of ending the engagement when he found out that Mary was pregnant, but God quietly intervened in a dream.
3. In obedience to God Joseph went ahead with the plans to make Mary his wife, but he did not consummate the relationship until after Jesus was born.
4. The Empire wide census would cause Joseph and Mary to journey to Bethlehem where Jesus would be born fulfilling the prophecy of Micah.
5. God’s hand was on the events and circumstances leading up to the moment when Jesus would be born.
II. Paul gives us some insight into solving the puzzle of the incarnation.
A. Jesus’ life was characterized by the trait of humility which Paul says should mark our lives.
1. Paul is speaking to the entire Philippian church and trying to help them see the importance of modeling Christ’s attitude of service.
2. Certainly as God, Jesus Christ did not need anything! He had all the glory and praise of heaven. With the Father and the Spirit, He reigned over the universe.
3. It is very important for us to distinguish between personal and positional equality with God.
a. As to His Person, Christ always was, is, and will be equal with God. It would be impossible for Him to give that up.
b. Positional equality is different. From all eternity Christ was positionally equal with His Father, enjoying the glories of heaven.
4. Jesus did not consider this position something that He had to hold on to at all costs. When a world of lost mankind needed to be redeemed, He was willing to relinquish His positional equality with God—the comforts and joys of heaven.
5. Jesus did not just take on the form of a human, but of a slave. He went far beyond any of us in any act of service. He made servanthood His essential mission.
B. Jesus’ divinity and glory were veiled by His humanity and mortality but during the time He walked upon this earth He never ceased to be God.
1. “Being made” implies the conception and birth process. Birth and infancy are themselves risks, so they suggest again the helplessness to which Christ submitted himself.
2. “Likeness” reiterates his complete identification with humanity.
3. The very fact of practicing humility, so basic to the Christian lifestyle, and so contrary to the impulses of sinful and ego-centered man, is one men find exceedingly challenging and difficult.
4. But Christ’s way of living spoke volumes to the weakness of humans, and to the nature of the new life.
5. To be human was to be subject to “death.” But Paul added another marvel by reference to “death on a cross.”
C. When Jesus took on a human body, He faithfully submitted to the will of God by accomplishing the task for which He came, to die for sinful humanity.
1. Jesus who was equal with God has most fully revealed the truth about God: that God is love and that his love expresses itself in self-sacrifice—cruel, humiliating death on a cross—for the sake of those he loves.
2. Death by crucifixion was the most shameful form of execution. It might be compared to the gallows, the electric chair, or the gas chamber—reserved only for murderers. And that was the form of death reserved for heaven’s Best when He came into this world.
3. He was not allowed to die a natural death in bed. His was not to be an accidental death. He must die the shameful death of the cross.
4. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21—NIV)
5. Jesus went from the throne room to the manger and from the manger to the cross. He came to make it possible for us to be set free from sin and given the hope of eternal life.
6. If the story had ended with “death on a cross” we would wonder at the intent of such voluntary divine humiliation.
III. Understanding the deeper meaning of Christmas.
A. Christmas should teach us that God is capable of doing anything.
1. God not only has the ability to shape history, He orchestrates events to work His purpose out.
2. God has the ability to stir the hearts and minds of men. He apparently moved Caesar to plan a Empire wide census at just the right moment.
3. God has the ability stir life within a virgin’s womb.
4. God has the ability to squeeze Himself into the body of an infant.
5. If God has the power to accomplish this, imagine what He can accomplish in the lives of you and I.
B. Christmas should also teach us that there is no one that cannot be changed by the power of God.
1. God was able to provide man with hope in the midst of a seemingly hopeless situation.
2. Through His Son’s great sacrifice on the cross He was able to provide everyone with the opportunity to have their sins forgiven.
3. Although we were headed for death God was able to change that into life.
4. So are there any changes He cannot make in our lives?
C. Finally, Christmas should teach us that God can lead us anywhere?
1. We can never know where God might lead us.
2. He led His Son from heaven to the cross and then back to heaven once again.
3. God will lead us through our circumstances and place us exactly where He desires us to be.
4. So is there anything beyond His control?
Long ago, there ruled in Persia a wise and good king. He loved his people. He wanted to know how they lived. He wanted to know about their hardships. Often he dressed in the clothes of a working man or a beggar, and went to the homes of the poor. No one whom he visited thought that he was their ruler. One time he visited a very poor man who lived in a cellar. He ate the coarse food the poor man ate. He spoke cheerful, kind words to him. Then he left. Later he visited the poor man again and disclosed his identity by saying, “I am your king!” The king thought the man would
surely ask for some gift or favor, but he didn’t. Instead he said, “You left your palace and your glory to visit me in this dark, dreary place. You ate the course food I ate. You brought gladness to my heart! To others you have given your rich gifts. To me you have given yourself!”
