WHO IN THE WORLD IS CHRIST OF CHRISTMAS
John 1:1-14
Bob Marcaurelle
“Here is a man who was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village. He worked in a carpenter shop until he was thirty, and then for three years He was an itinerant preacher. He never owned a home. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family. He never went to college. He never put his foot inside a big city. He never traveled two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He never did one of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself. . . While still a young man, the tide of popular opinion turned against Him. His friends ran away. One of them denied Him. He was turned over to His enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed upon a cross between two thieves. While He was dying His executers gambled for the only piece of property He had on earth - his coat. When He was dead, He was taken down and laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.
“Nineteen long centuries have come and gone, and today He is the centerpiece of the human race and the leader of the column of progress. I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever were built; all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man upon this earth as power¬fully as has that one solitary life.” (Author Unknown)
The story of Jesus begins in eternity past before time began and ends in eternity future when time shall be no more. We will travel from the Garden of Eden where the need for a Savior arose, through the pages of prophecy where the promise of a Savior was given; to Bethlehem where the Savior was born, to Palestine where the Savior lived for thirty years; to Calvary where He died; to the grave from which He rose; to two thousand years of history which counts its days from His birth, and to the end of the ages when He will return to earth. Consider the Christ, first as. . .
I. THE CREATIVE CHRIST (Jn. 1:1-4)
The Bible teaches that the Person who became Jesus of Nazareth two thousand years ago always existed. Jesus Himself spoke of the glory He shared with the Father “before the world was” (Jn. 17:5). Paul said Jesus “existed in the form of God and thought it not robbery to be equal with God” (Phil. 2:6, 7). John calls Him the “Word” or Logos and says “in the begin¬ning” He was, He was with God, He was God and all things were made through Him (Jn. 1:1-4).
This world with its molecules and mountains is the autograph album of Jesus, with His signature on every page.
The Carpenter from Nazareth is the Architect of the universe. Jesus is the Designer behind all design, the Lawmaker behind all law, the Creator behind all creation.
His power hurled the planets into space billions of years ago. His will keeps them in their orbits with meticulous accuracy - not varying one second in a million years.
He set the sun in the sky-blue canvas. He scooped out the ocean floors and from His silver chalice poured forth the rivers. Every exploding universe and every blade of grass, every seeing eye and every beating heart owes its existence to Jesus, the Creative Christ.
The golden sun, the silvery moon
And all the stars that shine
Were made by His omnipotent hand
And He’s a friend of mine.
II. THE CRADLED CHRIST (Jn. 1:14)
Wonder of all wonders - He whom the heavens could not contain was wrapped in swaddling clothes and placed in a manger. “The Word was made flesh!” (Jn. 1:14). God became a man. The Creator became a creation. A. H. Strong calls this “the crowning mystery of the Christian scheme.” Martin Luther said we would need “new tongues” to properly set forth the truth of the incarnation.
The entrance of Jesus Christ into this sin-stained race of ours was the act of God. It was accomplished from above. This is the truth which emerges from the virgin birth. His unusual life demands an unusual entrance. He Who is far different from any other man began as no other man.
Those who discard the miraculous birth of the Savior must also discard the life of the Savior for it is equally miraculous. Halde¬man has well said: “He who denies the virgin birth - denies Bible Christianity, smites the mother of our Lord with shame, snatches the crown of deity from Jesus’ brow, strips Christ of His sinless humanity, makes the cross a blood stained failure, and bids us face eternity with no light in the darkness.”
He was not God in a human body. He was God in a human being, like us in every way except without sin. He who feeds the animals and calls Himself the “Bread of Life” knew hunger. He who poured forth the rivers and capped the mountains with snow cried ,”I thirst.”
He who is our rest was weary. He who casts out devils was called a devil. He who answers our prayers, prayed. He who is the light of the world closed His eyes in the darkness of death.
He who is the good Shepherd became the Lamb led to slaughter. He who holds the stars in the palm of His powerful hand fell beneath the weight of the cross.
He became what we are, said Augustine, that He might make us what He is. He who was rich, says the Bible, for our sakes, became poor (2 Cor. 8:9).
Jesus came down from heaven’s heights to earth’s depths; from heav¬en’s coronations to earth’s curses; from heaven’s blessings to earth’s burdens; from heaven’s riches to earth’s rags; and from the glory place to the gory place.
The immortal God entered time, which He created and was “made flesh” in Jesus. Every nerve was divinely handwritten; every bone was divinely sculp¬tured, every muscle, said R. G. Lee, was a pulley divinely swung.
In eternity He rested on the bosom of the Father without a mother. In time He rested on the bosom of His mother, without an earthly father.
The supreme mystery of the ages is how God could become a baby but that is the message of the Bible voiced so eloquently by the prophet Isaiah, “For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given. . .and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” (Is. 9:6).
I know now how that Bethlehem’s Babe
Could in the God-head be,
I only know that manger child
Has brought God down to me
From "Who in the World is Jesus?" Available free from bmarcaurelle@charter.net
