MISFIT CHRISTMAS: PARADOXES OF THE CHRIST CHILD
1 Tim. 3:16
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR
1. CHRISTMAS PLAY JOSEPH DECIDES TO MAKE RESERVATIONS
a. The Director of a Christmas play was nervous when she cast Jimmy, the middle-school class clown, as Joseph in the Christmas Pageant. Her fears were realized when Jimmy decided to do a little improvisation by pulling out his cell phone in the pageant’s opening scene.
b. The astonished Director, who was narrating, asked, “What are you doing with your phone?” Jimmy smiled and replied, “This year I’m phoning that inn to make a reservation!”
2. EMAILING MONEY
a. A young woman suggested to her mother that she should go “paperless” by sending emails as a way to save money and not have to pay for stamps. Being an older person, her mother chaffed at changing her methods, but at last she began sending emails.
b. So at Christmas the young woman received an email with a picture of a $100 bill from her mother with the short note, “Merry Christmas, Darling. You’re right—it is cheaper to email than to send Christmas cards. Love, Mom.”
3. Q: What do you get if Santa goes down the chimney when a fire is lit? A: Crisp Kringle. Q: What do you get when you combine a Christmas tree with an iPad? A: A pineapple.
B. TEXT
“And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory” 1 Tim. 3:16.
C. THESIS
1. Paul spoke of the Incarnation using the Greek word, mysterion that we translate as “mystery.” However, the use of this word often meant things which couldn’t be known. The Incarnation IS knowable; it’s baffling, but it’s an open secret.
2. It’s an enigma, because it contains the elements of paradox. This morning we’re on the theme of “A Misfit Christmas.” A misfit is someone that doesn’t quite fit, is different than expected. God becoming man is one of the most astounding incongruities of all time.
3. We’re looking at five profound paradoxes of the Incarnation. The first paradox is the Christ Child was...
I. SO YOUNG, YET SO OLD
A. THE ETERNAL SON BORN INTO TIME
1. That night, when the angels sang to the shepherds in the fields outside Bethlehem, baby Jesus had just been born -- He was only hours old, yet only physically so. Micah said, “But you, Bethlehem...out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting” (5:2).
2. The Nicene Creed says, “I believe in one God, the Father Almighty …And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of his Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father...”
3. Jesus didn’t become God’s Son at Bethlehem, but had eternally been God’s Son (Ps. 2:7,12; Prov. 30:4; Heb. 1:2; John 3:17). There could be no “everlasting Father” (Isa. 9:6) unless there was an everlasting Son. He is self-existent; He had no beginning of days nor end of years; He is immortal, invisible, the only wise God, our Savior (Heb. 7:3).
B. JESUS WAS FULLY DIVINE
1. Col. 2:9: “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form.”
2. Bishop Cyril said, "For although visible and a child in swaddling clothes, and even in the bosom of His Virgin Mother, He filled all Creation as God and was a fellow ruler with Him who begat Him for the Godhead is without quantity and dimension and cannot have limits."
3. He was the Eternal Word. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the Only Begotten” John 1:1,14.
4. Christ the Creator. John 1:3, “Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” Col. 1:16-17: “For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities….He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”
5. Jesus was Fully human & Fully God. The Son didn’t cease to be God when he became a man. He added manhood but he did not subtract deity. He was fully God and fully man—the God-man.
II. SO POOR, YET SO RICH
A. THE POVERTY OF CHRIST
1. If we had chosen the parents for the King of Kings, surely we would have chosen parents who were wealthy, well-educated, well-connected politically, and possibly were royalty themselves. That’s where the Magi first looked.
2. We would have wanted His birth to be safe and antiseptic – at the best hospital in the country, with the best doctors in attendance. He had none of those advantages!
3. He was born to poor peasants under the most pitiful circumstances; who do we know who’ve been placed in a cattle feeding trough for a baby-bed?
4. He left heavenly perfection to walk on dusty roads, to smell human sweat and stench. He worked at a manual-labor job until 30, then went out to share the good news, living like a beggar, with no place to lay His head!
5. He was often hungry—a homeless person! When He was dying the soldiers gambled for His robe, the only thing He owned; and He was placed in a borrowed tomb through the pity of a friend!
B. HE MADE US RICH!
1. Paul said, “...though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich” 2 Cor. 8:9.
2. We became rich by His poverty. Some millionaires, in becoming rich, have made many poor; but Christ, by becoming poor, has made many rich. He makes us rich in righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21). And all who trust in Him are made heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ of ALL THINGS!
3. A midwife was called, one wet, wintry night to a gypsy camp to deliver a child. The mother-to-be apologized for the circumstances which were pitifully poor. The midwife answered, “The Greatest Baby ever born first saw the light of day in a far worse place than this!” The third paradox is He was...
III. SO HELPLESS, YET SO POWERFUL
A. THE GOD WHO BECAME WEAK
1. The appearance of the Lord of the Universe as a helpless baby is startling! There’s nothing as helpless as a baby. They can’t speak, feed or protect themselves, or even roll over. It takes 2 years until they can communicate their needs. What helplessness! That Almighty God would place Himself in the power of His fallen creation is a reversal so staggering that it boggles the mind. And yet that’s what Christmas is about!
2. The One who has the power to crush galaxies like egg shells, in the kenosis, set aside His power. “...although He was in the form of God did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but EMPTIED HIMSELF...” Phip. 2:6-7, Mounce Gr-Engl. Text. He had the powers, but chose to set them aside.
3. How far down God was willing to come for us! The God who fills all things visible and invisible, one day compressed himself down to a divine cell and fused with the ovum of a Jewish teenager! And the God-Man was born -- Undiminished Deity, perfect humanity. Immanuel – ‘God with us.’
4. HE’S THE GOD WILLING TO HAVE WOUNDS
“The other gods were strong, but Thou wast weak.
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne.
But to our wounds, only God’s wounds can speak;
And not a god has wounds but Thou alone.”
--Edward Shillito, “Jesus of the Scars,”
Areopagus Proclamation 10, No. 7 (April 2000)
5.Oh! The beauty of those wounds! Who is worthy as Jesus is worthy to receive honor and glory and power?
B. EVEN IN WEAKNESS, HE WAS STRONG
1. Mark Lowry couldn’t help wondering if Mary realized that first Christmas, when she’d touched Jesus’ hands and feet, that those were the same fingers that had scooped out the oceans and formed the seas. His feet were the same feet that had walked on streets of gold and had been worshipped by angels.
2. Those little lips were the same lips that had spoken the world into existence. And when Mary kissed her little baby, she wasn’t just kissing another baby - she was kissing the face of God!
3. Yet this Man grew up and walked on water, commanded the winds & waves and they obeyed Him, drove out the demon spirits, and healed the sick, restored peace to the troubled minds, and most of all, gave forgiveness to all the guilty souls who repented and turned to Him for help. What a friend we have in Jesus! The fourth paradox was He...
IV. SO MUTE, YET SPEAKING TO ALL
A. SPEECHLESS!
1. How incredible is the scene of that stuffy stable – the Word unable to say a word. The One who framed the organs of speech powerless to pronounce a single syllable.
2. The divine Being who named each of the billions of stars was incapable of saying His own mother’s name. Later it was said, “No man ever spoke like this man!” (John 7:46) – yet at Christmas the Word incarnate was deprived of speech!
B. “WHO ELSE HAS THE WORDS OF LIFE?”
1. How vocal He is now! His words have been translated into nearly every known language. They’ve been studied and memorized since they were uttered. They’ve been more influential for the good than all the sayings of man put together!
2. Philip Schaff said, “He never wrote a book, and yet all the libraries of the country could not hold the books that have been written about Him. He never wrote a song, and yet He has furnished the theme for more songs than all the song writers combined. He never founded a college, but all the schools put together cannot boast of having as many students.”
3. Everything He ever said or did has value for us today and that is something you can say of no other man, dead or alive.
V. SO EARTHLY, YET SO HEAVENLY
A. ORIGIN OF EARTHLY LIFE
1. Every baby is a blend of earthliness and heavenliness. Nothing could be closer to the soil than a little child. It is intensely and immensely physical. It is a bundle of biological needs. It is of the earth, earthy.
2. And yet nothing is more heavenly than a baby. Its chubby little face is cherubic. Its touch is as gentle as an angel’s. It’s smile is like a flash of heaven’s glory.
B. ALSO THE ORIGIN OF HEAVENLY LIFE
1. So it was with the Babe of Bethlehem. He was earthy, a normal infant. Luther said, “There in a stable lay the Creator of the world. And there was the maid of 15 years bringing forth her firstborn without water, fire, light or pan – a sight for tears! He was a real baby with flesh, blood, hands, and legs. He slept, cried, and did everything else that a baby does, only without sin.”
2. And yet He was “the Lord from heaven” (1 Cor. 15:47); who even then was in heaven (John 3:13) and now is in heaven interceding for us, and will come again.
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION: PEACE CHILD
1. In 1962, the Sawi people of New Guinea still lived in relative isolation. They were head-hunting cannibals. Don and Carol Richardson, a missionary couple, attempted to share Christ with them. Two rival Sawi tribes, fascinated by the Richardsons, moved their villages right around the missionaries’ jungle home.
2. But Don became frustrated by his inability to find a point of contact. He was also discouraged by the 14 civil wars he had already counted right outside his front door now that the two tribes lived side by side.
3. Eventually, the Richardsons decided to leave. However, the Sawi response surprised them: "If you’ll stay, we promise we’ll make peace in the morning."
4. The next morning the Richardsons awoke to see the most amazing ritual they had ever witnessed. The two tribes were lined up outside their houses, on either side of the clearing. Finally, one man dashed into his hut, grabbed his newborn son, and began to run across the meadow towards the other tribe. His expression betrayed absolute agony. His wife ran after him, screaming and begging him to give the baby back to her.
5. But her husband wouldn’t stop. He ran over to the other tribe and presented the boy to them. "Plead the peace child for me. I give you my son, and I give you my name," he said. Moments later, someone from that tribe performed the same agonizing sacrifice with the same intensity and passion. Richardson found out later that as long as those two children remained alive, the tribes were bound to peace. If they died, then cannibalism, murder, and civil war would break loose.
6. While this amazing scene unfolded before him, Don suddenly realized that this was the analogy he needed to communicate Christ. The next time he spoke to the Sawi elders he told them of the perfect Peace-Child, Jesus, that God gave to us at Christmas to make peace for us. Eventually, droves of Sawi became followers of Christ.
7. Later the Sawi quoted with deep understanding the words, "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulders, and He shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace” (Isa. 9:6).
B. THE CALL
1.How many of you need the Peace Child to reconcile you with God? Slip up your hands.
2. How many of you have a sad heart this Christmas? Do some of you have troubles? Are you overwhelmed?
3. Let’s let the Cause of Christmas, Jesus Christ, heal and handle all your difficulties. PRAYER.
[This message had influence from an article by Ian MacPherson entitled “The Paradoxes of the Incarnation,” in the Pentecostal Evangel, 12-21-1986]
