The birth of God

‘And the word became flesh and dwelt among us’ ……

If anyone has seen a child come into the world, they will know something of the magic of seeing the moment when what was not becomes what is. The moment when new life takes on flesh in the external world and is made known to its parents, is a revelation. This new creature, suddenly alive, embodied is a whole new reality. What was only a heart beat, a rounded belly, black and white sketches on a scan becomes a real creature with a face you can touch: it is the magic and mystery of life itself.

The moment of Jesus’ birth was just the same, except what was coming into being at that moment, was not only another human life, but it was a divine-human life. Christmas is a celebration of God’s birth – His birth into our world, a world where things come into being – take on shape and form and live – a world different from the divine world. The two worlds mixed – and Jesus was born.

Some cynical voices, some agnostic voices, some atheist voices and just some average voices often tell us that God is absent; they say God doesn’t care – God doesn’t speak, God doesn’t intervene, God is not there. Well, Christians very empathically say, well hang on a minute; he actually bothered to be born, to become just like us, to let us know about himself. That seems to me like a God who is very present if you ask me.

God became a human being to teach us about Himself, his character, his personality. God is born in order that we might learn who God is – because we are creatures that are born: he wants to communicate with us so much he becomes one of us: ‘in these last days God has spoken to us by a Son’ – ‘He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being’. Christians believe that Jesus is God’s Son – if He is not God’s son then there is nothing to the Christian faith. He cannot simply be a good man, that would be great if he were a good man that happened to live 2000 years ago, but he wouldn’t have changed the course of history if he just happened to be a very ethical and good person. Even if he happened to be a martyr to that goodness, that’s very loving but it doesn’t really change very much. For people die all over the world today for things they believe in, for good reasons, but that doesn’t change the course of history. Christians only have something to proclaim because they believe that Jesus is God’s Son, meaning that God actually chose to make himself known to his created order, by becoming incarnate, taking on flesh, becoming like us so that he might teach us who and what he really is.

So at Christmas we celebrate like new parents, that moment when we see for the first time something of the shape, the form, the look of the new child. It is for the first time that we can hold them, we can see them, and we can hear and smell them. The nativity scenes begin to tell us that story – to communicate with us who and what God is. The familiar scene has a Virgin birth, a star, shepherds, wise men from afar, Mary and Joseph with donkeys and sheep. From before his birth God tells us all the time about who He is. He is humble, he comes to the poor and lowly, he has no status, no privilege. He has no home, but shares a stable with animals, and yet there is A sign of something different, the star that leads people to Him, the Virgin birth. And so we begin to taste this God – this God who has become flesh, this God who has given himself a body and a voice. But we must wait; we must wait for Jesus to grow, to become a man and to teach us even more. Christmas is only the beginning of the Christian story, the moment when everything changes for human kind. But, it is as a man that Jesus leads us into more truth – it is as a man that Jesus reveals the Father’s face in its fullest form. Christmas is the first chapter of the most life-changing and extraordinary story that has ever been told. It has the key to eternal life --- don't stop reading.