Advent 2021: Christ In Our Mess
Anyone contemplating the [incarnation] needs to be newly and more deeply aware every day that something scandalous has occurred: that God, in His absolute being, has resolved to manifest Himself in a human life. He must be scandalized by this, he must feel his mind reeling, the very ground giving way beneath his feet; he must at least experience that ‘mystery’ of non-comprehension which transported Jesus’ contemporaries. – Hans Ur Von Balthasar
The subject of the incarnation has lost its wonder in much of the church, because of the low view of God and our disconnect from the anticipation and longing that the prophets and patriarchs lived in related to the coming Messiah. For many, God made a small step down to the stable. Yet it was no small step for the infinite eternal God, Creator of heaven and earth to condescend to take on the form of the creature. Solomon exclaimed, “Not even the highest heavens can contain you!” (1 Kg 8:27) The foundations of the heavenly temple convulse when He speaks and manifests His glory. God cannot create a substance to contain His glory. He fills all in all. He dwells in the eternal now encompassing all that is past, present and future simultaneously.
“Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales; behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust... All the nations are as nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness,” Isaiah says. (Is 40:15,17) There was not a small step down from God to man. There was an infinite chasm that we would never be able to cross. A.W. Tozer said, “He is as high above an archangel as above a caterpillar, for the gulf that separates the archangel from the caterpillar is but finite, while the gulf between God and the archangel is infinite.” (Knowledge of the Holy) The late Larry King was once asked if he had the opportunity to interview one man in history, who would it be, and what would be his question? King answered that that one man would be Jesus Christ and that He would ask him, “Are you indeed virgin-born?” King said, “The answer to that question would explain history to me.”
The fullness of the transcendent God came through Mary’s birth canal, covered in water, blood, and after birth. They wrapped in a blanket and laid Him among the refuse of a stable in Bethlehem. Sinai was in the stable. God introduced Himself to the earth, under rumors of bastardry, hidden away for only Mary, Joseph, and a few shepherds to see. Jesus was not born into earthly influence or power. Born in Bethlehem and raised in Nazareth. His ambition was not to become famous, wealthy, or overtake and overthrow power structures, but instead to please the Father. He chose to reveal His incarnate glory by being born into a small town, to a blue-collar family, to an unwed mother.
Jesus appeared in the place we least expected.
The message of Advent tells us that all our ideas are wrong. What we esteem as lowly, God sees as glorious. What we avoid in our piety, God moves toward with His glory. What we see as weak, God uses to display his strength. God chooses to hide His glory so only the humble will find it. (Prov 25:2) All the promises of God were revealed and confirmed in Joseph’s illegitimate son. That incarnate deity then lived a quiet, normal, peaceful life. The offense towards Jesus was fueled by the unmet expectations of Israel who was looking for a political leader, a commander-in-chief, and an overthrower of kingdoms. They were not looking for a slain lamb and a servant of all. He embraced every stage of the human experience that He might meet you in gentleness on every step of your journey. He lived a real-life so that He could walk with you in real life.
His commitment to you goes beyond paying for sins. When the council of the Trinity decided that the Son would become a man before the foundation of the world, He would have to become a man forever. This was more than God making a short-term visit, relating to us in a human projection of Theophany. When He took on the human frame in Mary’s womb, He would never be able to shed it again. He is so committed to us that He joined himself to our very frame, flesh, and bones. He is committed to us for eternity. For a billion times a billion years you and I will be able to relate to the Second Person of the uncreated Trinity face to face in a human body. He doesn’t grow weary with us on the journey. Not only can He walk with us through every stage but through every circumstance. In the incarnation, there is no stage of the human experience that God has passed over. There is no part of the journey He was unwilling to walk through in order to walk with us as a gentle Shepherd, able to sympathize with us in our weakness. There is no phase too small or insignificant about our lives that would warrant Him bypassing. He has fully embraced us in the Beloved from zygote to death.
The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful-- for he cannot deny himself. - 2 Timothy 2:11-13
The life of Jesus is not abstract and beyond reach. It is dirty, messy, and real. Jesus was a refugee. Jesus had unusual family dynamics. Jesus felt out of place. Jesus was reliant on others. Jesus had friends betray Him. Jesus had money stolen from Him. Jesus had leaders accuse Him. Jesus embraced the Father’s ways when His soul could not fully comprehend. Jesus grew hungry, thirsty, and tired in His body. Jesus had to grow in wisdom and favor. Jesus lived a real life.
He is not only Christ exalted. He is Christ in our mess.
Only the humble believe Him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that He does wonders where people despair, that He takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly…. God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as His instruments and performs His wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; He loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken.”
― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God Is in the Manger
God was wrapped in humanity so that humanity could be wrapped in God. The Church, like Jesus, now lives among a broken world clothed with God. It is the manger where Jesus is among our mess. The manger serves as a picture of the glory of God hidden in these clay jars. He is still bringing many sons to glory in stables and humble places across the earth. (1 Jn 2:6) God still fills the lowly things with His glory. He chooses weak things to display His power. God glorifies Himself by showing off His power and strength through broken, weak, and lowly people. “Not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth,” Paul says, “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Cor 1:26-29) He confounds the wisdom of the wise and the knowledge of the prudent. The incarnation shouts to us that God is determined to dwell with, wrap himself around, walk with, and display His glory through weak humans, creatures of dust! The word is still becoming flesh through His body; His glorious and messy church. And we are to walk as He walked.
Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking… - 1 Peter 4:1
Through humility, hiddenness, meekness, and brokenness, the glory of God was made known to all the world. In the same way, that same wisdom is now being made known to powers and principalities through the church. God is still looking for “Bethlehem stables” to give birth to His purposes that will touch the nations. God still fills lowly things with His glory.
To a church obsessed with influence, power, prominence, and politics, I say to you: remember the manger.
“The manger at Christmas means that, if you live like Jesus, there won’t be room for you in a lot of inns.” – Tim Keller, Hidden Christmas
