Luke 2:12 This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
The Second Sign of the Christmas to Come: Wrapped in Cloths
I. The sign isn’t useless
As a general rule, when people revolve their lives around what kind of clothes other people are wearing - when they go to fashion shows or have to shop at the mall for the latest and most hip trends - it seems like they’ve become materialistic. This is coming from someone who still wears jeans he had in college - but there’s a lot more important things in life than clothing. In a matter of stewardship - it seems to be bad stewardship to spend a hundred dollars on a pair of jeans or a thousand dollars on a dress when it could go to much more worthy causes. Some people need fashionable clothing in keeping with a job they have or may be able to afford it and still be generous with other causes. Others say that good clothes make you feel good. Yet Peter wrote in 1 Peter 3:3-4, “Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.” With these words, Peter is basically telling us not to base our beauty on the outside - God’s kind of beauty is not skin deep. He doesn’t say you can’t own outward adornment, he just tells us NOT to base our beauty on clothing.
In line with this, the second sign of the Coming One seems rather insignificant at best - as it talks about the clothing of the Christ. There were no other predictions about His clothing in the Old Testament or New Testament. I mean, honestly, who cares about what kind of clothes the Savior would be wearing? This isn’t a fashion show. Yet the angels mention it to the shepherds as the second of three signs to look for. A baby wrapped in cloths - or as the KJV says - in swaddling clothes. What it literally means in the Greek is strips of (that is - cut or ripped) cloth. It’s rather interesting how God does this at times - how He puts significance on items that we would just look over without a glance. The washing of an infant, the eating of bread and wine, things that seem common in life - take on special meaning when God’s Word points it out to us. That’s the KEY - God’s Word. God’s Word can turn any common item into greater worth than gold - much like the handkerchiefs and aprons that simply touched Paul were used to heal the sick and chase out demons. (Acts 19:12)
In this case, the angels especially point the shepherds to the strips of cloth. There are no other Biblical interpretations of this cloth. The most basic and safest understanding of these strips then would be that these humble means of clothing were meant to distinguish the baby from any other baby. They would first of all know which baby would be the Christ by the clothing he was wearing - not robes or meticulously stitched blankets of silk and tapestry - but mere strips of cloth. I don’t know whether this was a normal way of “clothing” babies back in Jesus’ day. I wasn’t able to read anything either for or against it. One commentator suggested that a tight wrap would help keep a baby’s limbs straight. Whether this is true or not - I don’t know. The overall sign of the mere strips of cloth seems to me to infer a sense of humility - there would be nothing flashy about this baby’s clothing. Just some strips of cloth wrapped around him - that’s all.
The more you think about these mere “strips of cloth” however, the more incredible they become. How so? Think about the very concept of who this baby is. Just in the previous verse, the angel said to the shepherds, “Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:11) This is Christ THE LORD. For the first time in the eternal history of our God - the Lord - He was wearing clothes. How can you put clothes on God? Even if you could, how could you find ones big enough? XXXXXXXXL? Not big enough! Yet here we see the LORD wearing strips of cloth!
II. The LORD is used to wearing clothes
In reality, this shouldn’t surprise us. Why? You see, our LORD has worn clothing more than once in His history. Throughout the Old Testament He wore different clothes. When He appeared to Elijah, He chose a gentle whisper. He wore fire in the desert. He wore an ark and resided in a temple. He clothed Himself in lightning and clouds and voice throughout the Israelites’ journey to Mt. Sinai and beyond. God has accustomed Himself to wearing different kinds of clothes. The surprising thing here is the size and majesty of these clothes - they were just mere strips of cloths. Instead of wearing a pillar of fire or coming in the clothes of a powerful man, God came in the flesh and blood of a tiny baby wrapped in little cloths.
God had to do this. Why? When Moses asked to see God, what was God’s answer?
Exodus 33:18-23 Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.” And the LORD said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” Then the LORD said, “There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen.”
If God didn’t wear these “clothes” for us, we would not be able to see Him - because He is too majestic. He has to clothe Himself to come to us. If Jesus had not come in these strips of cloth - but in a powerful thunderstorm or a mighty palace, who of us would feel able to hold such a baby? If He were wearing some rich and embroidered clothing, wouldn’t we feel too dirty to hold such a baby? We would be afraid to open the present because the wrapping paper was so precious.
The strips of cloth show how God wanted to come to us. It shows us that God never intended for us to be enamored with Christ’s clothing. Isn’t this why God still clothes Himself when He comes to us today. Did you ever stop to consider what simple means God still uses to come to us? God commands us - His common day shepherds - to look for Him in the Word, baptism, and the Lord’s Supper. He has baptism be conducted with mere water - something that covers over two thirds of our planet. As a general rule, when people see water, they don’t sit and stare at it - unless of course it is part of a beautiful landscape of some sort. Most of the time we drink it without thinking twice. By it’s nature it is clear and translucent - allowing other things to be seen THROUGH it. In the same way, God chose water to be used as a connecting link between us and His Holy Spirit. Acts 2:38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Think about wine and bread. When we take the Lord’s Supper we don’t stress over what kind of wine is used - whether it’s Mogen David or Boone’s Farm. Wine is wine - as long as it’s fruit of the vine - grape wine - it doesn’t matter what brand we use in communion. All we concentrate on are the words, “this is my body - given for you.” As we taste that simple and tasteless unleavened bread and that wine, we know we are receiving the body and blood of the Lord, and we are assured our sins are forgiven through faith in the sacrifice that Jesus made two thousand years ago. The importance to us is the promise within the elements. We don’t sit and worship the bread and wine on the altar or set aside the leftover elements of baptism as some holy water. We simple sit in awe at the simple means that God uses to come to us.
These elements, as offensive as they are to our reason which expects God to come in the fires of Pentecost or the lightning of Sinai - are things that we can grasp and hold and taste and feel and hear. They aren’t beyond the grasp of our human senses. Strips of cloth are not so high and mighty that we would feel afraid to touch them or even get them dirty. In the same way, we aren’t afraid to eat the body and blood of Jesus, even though we’re sinful. We aren’t afraid to be baptized into Christ either with the waters of baptism. These are not death defying rites of passage. They are simple means. They are meant to be. Strips of cloth are common every day items. That’s what God to clothe Jesus in - so we COULD hold him and grasp Him.
I can recall watching the Luther movie and seeing them reenact Luther’s elevation of the host. He was so nervous in handling the Lord’s Supper that He shook and spilled a bunch on the altar cloth. Luther felt unworthy to touch such holy items - as he believed that the bread and wine on the altar had completely changed into the body and blood. The Catholic Church went so far as to adore this host and worship it in a way that is never prescribed in the Bible. God didn’t choose this sacrament to make us afraid. He did it to give us Himself for forgiveness. He chose these things so we wouldn’t become enamored with the CLOTHING instead of the Savior IN the clothing. Strips of cloth serve a simple purpose - to show where the shepherds and where we can find Christ. The same rings true of the water of baptism and the wine and bread of the Lord’s Supper. Through these elements God is saying to us, “I want you to hold me. I want you touch me - even eat me.” God says this because He knows how sinful we are - how we like Luther feel so unworthy to have Jesus blood poured over us through the waters of baptism - to have Jesus body and blood enter us through the Lord’s Supper. Of course we don’t feel worthy. So He wraps Himself in common elements with a PROMISE of forgiveness so that we feel comfortable to hold Jesus and taste Him and feel Him through the arms of faith. The strips of cloth show us a merciful God who doesn’t want to chase us away - but want us like the shepherds to approach Him - even if we stink of the field and are covered in sheep dung as it were.
III. The LORD needed strips of cloth
There’s something that seems even more incredible - that the LORD needed these strips of cloth. The very one who called Himself a Refuge in Psalm 46, needed refuge from the weather that He created. This is also a completely ODD thing. When God produces lightning, He doesn’t worry about hitting Himself. When God creates a thirty below zero day - He doesn’t worry about freezing in it. As He abides in the 150 degree heat of the worst desert, God doesn’t complain about needing an air conditioner. The LORD stretched out the dimensions of the earth and never once worried about what would happen. One of my favorite Psalms is Psalm 2. It reads,
Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the LORD and against his Anointed One. “Let us break their chains,” they say, “and throw off their fetters.” The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them. Then he rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath, saying, “I have installed my King on Zion, my holy hill.” I will proclaim the decree of the LORD: He said to me, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession. You will rule them with an iron scepter; you will dash them to pieces like pottery.” Therefore, you kings, be wise; be warned, you rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.
This Psalm clearly declares the sheer power of God. When nations gather together against Him - He laughs. He doesn’t NEED the protection of Michael and His angels. He just laughs at anyone who threatens Him. He paints His Son - His Chosen One - as a powerful King who doesn’t need protection from anyone. YET - this verse shows the LORD being clothed by his parents. Why? Because He needed clothing. If He weren’t clothed that evening, I could almost guarantee you that He - the LORD - would have frozen.
Isn’t that shocking? It doesn’t seem right that the LORD who owns and controls the heavens and the earth would need clothing to shelter Him from the very nature which He created. Like I said, believing in such a LORD would seem crazy. Yet the Scriptures show us this very kind of LORD throughout the lifetime of Jesus. We see Him grow up to be a man who cries, weeps, sleeps, bleeds and dies. This same baby in cloths would later on then wear the crown of thorns, the purple robe, and then be stripped down to nothing but a pitiable mass of flesh and bones at the cross. As many times as we have seen this scene in our mind’s eye of faith - it is still shocking, is it not - when you consider WHO this baby and this man is - and what He is wearing?
The most shocking thing of all, however, is WHY Jesus wore these clothes. Hebrews 2:14-17 says,
Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.
Jesus chose to wear flesh and blood - He chose to become weak so that we could become rich. Imagine how wonderful it would be to be in the presence of God - living face to face with Him and enjoying heaven. Who of us, having tasted such a wonderful salvation, would ever choose in a million years ever to come back and live our lives all over again on this earth - to put aside our heavenly robes for thirty three years - just to live with a bunch of people who wanted nothing to do with you in the first place? Why did Jesus do that? Because HE WANTED TO DIE FOR US - and take Satan’s grip off of us. That is beyond reason. The proof of this love starts in the manger - as you see Jesus NEED to wear clothes - so that YOU would have clothes to wear. What a great sacrifice this was!
Most every child or husband knows the following scenario. You go to the closet, pick out your clothes for the day - put them on and then go in the kitchen to eat breakfast. You’re happy with everything, and then your wife or your mom asks the question, “you’re not wearing that, are you?” How do you answer that without being a smart aleck? It’s not as if you like to put on one set of clothes to eat your breakfast and then change into different clothes for the rest of the day. She obviously doesn’t like your choice of clothes - so you almost feel as if you have to go change your clothes.
As we hear from the angel to go and look for a baby wrapped in strips of cloth, we may wish to say to him, “excuse me, He’s not really wearing strips of cloth, is he? I’ll make sure to bring a new Baby outfit for Jesus - a more majestic robe and a cute little King’s crown.” The shepherds offered no change of clothing for Jesus. They were glad to see Him - even in strips of cloth. It wasn’t the clothes that mattered - but what was promised to be within in the strips of cloth - the Savior. They may not seem like proper “clothing” for the LORD to be wearing - but don’t let that concern you. Jesus needed to wear these clothes - so that He could be later clothed in our sinful garments - and we could then wear His holy garments. Instead of being offended at this second sign, welcome the strips of cloth through the humble arms of faith - recognizing that God wants to present Himself to us so that we can feel bold enough to grasp onto His promise of forgiveness in this little Baby. Amen.
