Who is the Christ of Christmas? Part 4

"While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She rapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn." -- Luke 2:6-7

THIS is the Christ of Christmas most of us are familiar with. The baby born and placed in a manger. The star, the shepherds, the kings....yes, that is the image most Christians think of when they think of Christmas.

Has it become so familiar, to Christians and non-Christians alike that we forget the utter magnitude of it?

I am awestruck at the thought of our Sovereign God, ruler of ALL creation, reigning supreme in Heaven one minute, stepping off His mighty throne to be born a helpless baby the next. And not a baby born in a castle fit for Him, but born in a stable, placed in a manger. Our awesome Lord and Savior, humbling Himself to this and for what? TO SAVE YOU AND ME FROM OUR OWN SIN AND DEATH!!

God sent His Son to live as an ordinary man among the very people who had broken His heart and turned from Him. He sent Him to fulfill a promise He made to us centuries before. He sent Him to save us from our unrighteousness.

He could have come as anyone, a King, a Prince, a Noble. He could have been born in a much nicer place. He could have lived a more opulent life. However, God chose to humble himself as a servant for our benefit....

"Who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross!" -- Philippians 2:6-8

But that my friends isn't the end of the story....yes, Jesus humbled himself as a servant and came into this world as an ordinary man. But because He was obedient to the Father, He didn't end that way....

"Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." -- Philippians 2:9-11

That is the Christ of Christmas!!