Birth of the Saviour

The name Dr. Alexander Fleming may be familiar to you. In 1928 he returned from a holiday to find mold growing on a Petri dish of bacteria. Unless you know of the suffering and deaths that occurred as a result of diseases that could not be treated before this discovery, then it’s difficult to appreciate the impact that penicillin had.

In the same way, unless you have an awareness of the extent of the fall of man from Genesis to before Christ’s birth, then it’s impossible to fully appreciate the impact that Christmas and the event we celebrate, the birth of the Saviour, has had on the world.

Here’s just a short list of rebellions against God before Jesus came.

Among men, it starts with Adam and Eve disobeying God followed by one of their sons killing the other. In the time of Noah (and we are still in the Genesis), the world has reached such levels of depravity, that God decides to kill all human beings on Earth except Noah, who “found favour in the eyes of the Lord” and his family. But descendants of Noah would regroup and gather in Babel and would build a great tower to reach God by their own ingenuity in direct contradiction to his commandment, to populate the earth. In response, God scattered them and confused their tongues. However, he took an old man and his aged wife, Abraham and Sarah, and raised up a nation from them, his very own, the chosen people, the Hebrews, later to be called Israelites.

But even their offspring become vile and inhumane. They would lie, cheat and nearly kill each other and end up exiled in Egypt. But God stays committed and makes a covenant with them. God sends Moses to lead them out of slavery from Egypt, but even then, they break the covenant with God. It’s one long story of rising up and falling down, all the while prophesying of a Messiah that would come to save God’s people from themselves and their own sin.

By the time the Old Testament comes to an end, it is clear, man cannot save himself. And then God is silent for 400 years. No prophets, no writings, and no Messiah. Yet that Messiah was long, long foretold, even from Genesis. After the serpent had deceived Adam and Eve to rebel against their creator, God spoke to the serpent and said this:  

Genesis 3:14-15 NKJV

“Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly, you shall go, And you shall eat dust All the days of your life. [15] And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.”

This as a reference to Christ, the Son of God, and also the ultimate member of Eve’s offspring. Satan would damage Christ, but Christ would have the ultimate victory on behalf of humanity on the cross of Calvary and through his resurrection. Those in Christ will celebrate that victory with Him for eternity.

And the Old Testament is dense with foreshadowings of Jesus, in fact, Jesus said the Old Testament was about him.

John 5:39, 46

”You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me…for if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me.”

Go back further to Isaiah, 700 years before the first Christmas.

Isaiah 9:6 NKJV

For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

So like I said, the Old Testament comes to an end and then silence for 400 years. A silence that is eventually broken, not by the rising up of a great warrior King who would destroy Isreal’s enemies as many longed for, but by the cry of a baby, in a stable in Bethlehem. This King would break the bondage of a different kind. 

Man’s rebellion against God sentenced him to an eternity without God and man had no way of fixing this problem himself. But God had a plan to reconcile man to himself, but it would cost his Son Jesus, everything.

Because he would have to leave behind his throne of Glory and be born into a hostile world, helpless as an infant and with a murderous king slaughtering every baby he could, to try to ensure this new King foretold from old, would not come to power.

But Jesus came to power in a different Kingdom, a Kingdom he told many about, as he went ministering to the sick and poor, curing illnesses, casting out demons, and forgiving sin. And on Good Friday, he suffered in ways, we don’t even have the ability to imagine. He was beaten, spat at, mocked, scourged, made to carry his own cross and then he was nailed to it, and either through suffocation or loss of blood or both, he died. But not before lifting his head to his Father in heaven and saying the words, “it is finished”. 

What did that mean? The Old Testament had introduced us to the concept of blood atonement and substitutionary atonement. In other words, someone else could die in your place. Hence the long history of animal sacrifices. So he paid the penalty for what you and I did and in return, he imparted his righteousness to us, so that we could be reconciled with the Father.

And that’s what Jesus came to do on that silent night in Bethlehem, save us from an eternity without God, by giving up everything, even his own human life, to the very last drop of his blood, so that God’s perfect justice could remain intact and even though we were guilty, Jesus paid the price and we could go free if we repent and believe in him.

People who don’t read God’s word can be fond of attempting to turn what it teaches on it’s head or find contradictions. So they say things like: “If God is all loving and cares about us, then why does he send people to hell.” The truth is, God sends no one to hell, we’re on our way there anyway. What God has done is put in place a rescue plan, he wants no one to go there. And what is that rescue plan. It couldn’t be simpler. Jesus says in:

John 14:6 NKJV

“I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me”.

People sometimes have a hard time these days conceiving of a place called hell, but think about it like this. In this world, we are all in receipt of God’s common grace, saint and sinner alike. Sunshine and soft rain fall equally on both. But hell is a place where God is not, where not even his common graces exist. No sunshine, no soft rain, no laughter, you’ll never hear the sound of waves breaking on a beach, and you’ll never again see a beautiful spring day, birds singing or a bee dancing from flower to flower.

So that’s what Christmas is about, the birth of a King, long foretold who came on a rescue mission and it cost him everything. And he paid it all. And all we have to do is follow the plan and He will get us home.

So Father in Heaven, we pray that, as we exchange gifts this Christmas, we never lose sight of this. That in exchanging gifts we are remembering the greatest gift ever offered and it’s offered to all of us. And it’s the gift that truly keeps on giving, not just on Christmas day, but every day of the year, every day of your life, and every day into eternity. All we have to do is accept it and respond by giving Him the only thing He wants, which is you. Amen.

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