Luke 2:12 And this shall be a sign to you; You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. Christmas is full of surprises. It brings in, as no other event ever did, the element of mystery, of wonder. Its testimony is, God became manifest in the flesh. The Eternal Word was joined with a perfect human nature. The miracle of the Incarnation transcends every other that has been and will be wrought. It is in itself a wonder so great that all the accompaniments of the birth of Jesus sink into comparative insignificance. We are, I fear, inclined to forget the majesty of the fact in the strangeness of its surroundings. We count it a wonderful thing that He should have been born in the stable of a country inn, whereas the real wonder is that such a birth should take place anywhere, and so I ask you to contemplate one of the signs by which the shepherds of Bethlehem were to find and know the incarnate God — "Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes." I. It reminds us, by way of analogy, of a fact which constitutes the most trying element in the mystery of the Incarnation, namely, that GOD THEREBY CAME WITHIN CERTAIN LIMITATIONS. HOW an uncreated and omnipresent, that is, a boundless, Infinite Being could be contracted within the circumference of a human life is the most puzzling problem of revelation. The impossibility of our understanding this is a temptation, not perhaps to deny, but to forget the deeper meaning of the Christmas feast. Remember, then, that within these swathing bands which encircled the infant form of Jesus there was bound the nature of a Being more than human, even God Himself. Men may call this an unreasonable tax upon our faith. It is rather a sign of God's condescension to human weakness. The whole secret of the history of idolatry among the Jews and the Gentiles was a longing for some visible manifestation of Him whom they felt they must worship. Man instinctively longs for some incarnate form, some Word of his Maker manifest in the flesh, some finite manifestation of the Infinite Father. And the birth of Jesus, the enshrining of God within a human form, the swathing of that power, which otherwise knows no bounds, was but an answer to man's desire. II. The sign holds good, not only of the nature of Christ, but likewise of THE LIFE WHICH, FROM FIRST TO LAST, HE LIVED. That also was like every purely human life, hemmed in. It unfolded according to the ordinary laws of growth. His babyhood was as real as His manhood. He increased in wisdom as well as stature. He learned gradually the wisdom which all the world now confesses. The common idea which people have of Jesus is that, being Divine, He was exempt from the ordinary conditions of common men; that He never knew constraint; that there were no barriers opposing Him, no bands fettering the free exercise of that Divine power which lay hidden within Him. Yet duty was sometimes hard for Him. He longed to do things which He might not attempt, because the higher and more spiritual dictates of His conscience forbade it. The kingdoms of this world and their glory looked as fair and tempting to His soul as they do to ours. But the law of righteousness, the swathing-bands of duty, the rules of obedience which God throws around us, likewise constrained Him. III. The manner of the Incarnation shows GOD'S ESTIMATE OF HUMAN NATURE. If you are ever tempted to despise human nature because you see it now and then wearing disagreeable phases, or to think ill of, nay, to slight, your friends, remember God's estimate of them. He does not thus stoop and toil to save the worthless. From being a King He descended to the lowest form of human life, entered the world in utter helplessness, was wrapped in swaddling clothes, and during all His development here on earth never rose above that form of a servant which He had taken. And He did all this, because even fallen man was dearer to His heart than the world of lost angels. (E. E. Johnson, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. |
    |