{"id":90387,"date":"2024-12-13T11:36:03","date_gmt":"2024-12-13T17:36:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/?p=90387"},"modified":"2024-12-16T12:43:02","modified_gmt":"2024-12-16T18:43:02","slug":"christmas-and-the-incarnation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/christmas-and-the-incarnation\/","title":{"rendered":"Christmas and the Incarnation"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Each year, we look forward to celebrating the birth of Christ on December 25th. We think of the Baby, the manger, and the wise men as we decorate our homes, sing carols, and read through Advent devotions. But how often do we think about the perspective of those who were waiting for the Messiah? <\/span>We celebrate the coming of God in the flesh – The Savior of the World. However, I think it\u2019s easy to forget what a complete and flabbergasting shock this arrival was to the people of the time<\/b>. Of all the potential entrances of the Messiah into the world, no one had anticipated God Himself entering His creation in poverty as a helpless baby. <\/span><\/p>\n

This Christmas season, let\u2019s consider three questions: What were they expecting? What did they receive? And what are we to do?<\/span><\/p>\n

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Related: Why Tell Lowly Shepherds?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What kind of Messiah were they expecting?<\/b><\/p>\n

The leaders and scribes awaiting the arrival of the Messiah, weren\u2019t expecting God incarnate (which simply means \u201cin flesh\u201d) at all. The religious leaders and many who followed them were waiting for a king or a warrior – someone who would tear down the current political authoritarian system and bring victory to God\u2019s people over their enemies. They didn\u2019t believe this without reason. <\/span><\/p>\n

As Dr. Les Crawford has correctly stated, prophecies such as those found in Genesis 49:10, Isaiah 11:4, Jeremiah  23:5-6 and 33:15-16 \u201cportray a powerful, all-conquering king who will defeat every enemy and restore Israel to its rightful place as God\u2019s people dwelling in security and prosperity.\u201d While there were numerous prophecies describing the Messiah as a suffering servant, these were given less attention by many ancient Jewish commentators in favor of the prophecies that described a militaristic warrior and king. But Jesus would defy all expectations.<\/span><\/p>\n

What kind<\/b> of<\/b> Messiah did they receive?<\/b><\/p>\n

First, it should be said that God did not just provide us with a handful of prophecies in the Old Testament that <\/span>only<\/span><\/i> describe the future arrival of an all-conquering king. <\/span>In fact, <\/b>no less than 333 prophecies were perfectly fulfilled by Jesus<\/b><\/a> by the time He completed His work on the cross.<\/b> These prophecies – in their totality – describe One who will come as a child (Is 7:14),  a suffering servant (Is 52-53), an all-knowing prophet (Deut 18:15), a mighty king (Is 11:4), a perfect sacrifice (Is 53:7), and God over all (Is 9:6)! Jesus, the Messiah, was all this and more. The Christ Hymn in Philippians 2:6-11 lays this out with incomparable beauty. Please take a moment to go and read it for yourself. I love this description of the hymn from <\/span>Enter the Bible:<\/span><\/a> <\/span><\/p>\n

The hymn or confession itself is one of the most significant depictions of Christ in the New Testament. The poetic language expresses the two natures of Christ, who was \u201cin the form of God\u201d and \u201cemptied himself, taking the form of a slave\u201d or servant. In this \u201chuman likeness\u201d and \u201chuman form,\u201d Christ \u201chumbled himself and became obedient to the point of death\u2013even death on a cross.\u201d At its midpoint, the hymn or confession turns to the action of God\u2019s exaltation, giving Christ \u201cthe name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus\u201d all the realms of creation are called to bow in homage and every tongue proclaim, \u201cJesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That <\/span><\/i>is the Messiah who they received and who is available for all to receive today. So, what are we to do with this today?<\/span><\/p>\n

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Related: The Great Gift of Our Creator<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What are we to do?<\/b><\/p>\n

There are a couple of actions we should take with this information.<\/span><\/p>\n

First, we should marvel at the wonder of our Savior anew this year. Take a moment to insert yourself into a culture that was expecting earthly and national promises to be fulfilled and instead met Jesus, God over all, who willingly set aside His glory to substitute Himself in our place and pay the price for our sins so that we may no longer be under law, but under grace (Romans 6:14). Simply astounding.<\/span><\/p>\n

Second, during the holiday season, and even into the New Year, take advantage of the opportunities to start conversations with others about the numerous manger scenes in stores and neighborhoods or the Christ-honoring hymns playing even in secular stores! Why not work a question or two into a conversation you\u2019re already having? God can use a simple question like, \u201chave you ever heard the story behind that manger scene?\u201d to take a conversation all the way to the Gospel. As the true story of our risen Messiah reminds us, you never quite know exactly what God will do – but we can rest assured that it will be wonderful!<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Each year, we look forward to celebrating the birth of Christ on December 25th. We think of the Baby, the manger, and the wise men as we decorate our homes, sing carols, and read through Advent devotions. But how often do we think about the perspective of those who were waiting for the Messiah? We […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50255,"featured_media":90391,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"It\u2019s easy to overlook what was truly accomplished in that Bethlehem manger. Take a moment and marvel the Messiah!","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[80],"tags":[102,1239,1238],"translator":[],"blog-author":[1230],"class_list":["post-90387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apologetics","tag-christmas","tag-incarnation","tag-messiah","blog-author-brock-anderson"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/607\/2024\/12\/Blog-ChristmasIncarnation-wisemen.jpg","meta_box":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50255"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90387"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90410,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90387\/revisions\/90410"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90387"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/translator?post=90387"},{"taxonomy":"blog-author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites-stage.josh.org\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/blog-author?post=90387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}