Thursday, December 22, 2016

Where Jesus was born tells us even more about the Savior God sent

Did baby Jesus arrive just in the nick of time? And was he born in a stable?  In this excerpt from The Radical Book for Kids, Champ Thornton briefly addresses these questions. 

How do these JC birth tidbits help us more deeply appreciate the God-child? 

Mary, Joseph and Jesus were turned away from not from an ancient hotel room, but from a standard, normal custom of Jewish hospitality and even potentially asked to spend the night in an underground cutout where we would normally store our Christmas ornaments. These details demonstrate further what was predicted about our Savior: 

"He was despised and rejected by men" (Isaiah 53:3).  Perhaps what Jesus experienced wasn't simply bad luck, but cold hostility. Many of us know the feeling. 

Yet "The stone that builders rejected, has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes." (Matthew 21:42; cf. Ps 118:22). 

Thank you Jesus, for arriving in the most humble way possible to reach those lowly in heart and stature!