Christmas. Few holidays are more celebrated. Few holidays are as adored, almost worshiped. Few have as many memories attached.
As Christians, we celebrate Christmas for many reasons. It’s a reminder of the first step to our salvation. So, we celebrate the initiation of God’s plan of salvation. We celebrate God’s giving his Son to mankind. We celebrate the beginning of redemption.
We naturally look at the nativity of Christ in human terms, usually not going beyond what Christ’s birth means to us. But while Christ’s birth was a time of great gain for us, I wonder what that gain meant for Christ himself?
Humanity meant humility
As a child, I remember always wanting bigger and better toys, specifically Lego sets. It’s something we do even as adults—wishing for better things. One rarely, if at all, wishes for less: a malfunctioning car, a decaying house, less friends, a pale and sickly complexion, etc.
But had we been in Christ’s place, would we have wished to become us?
None of us will ever understand the humiliation Christ underwent to become human, because we can’t see what’s so awful about being us. Yes, we may appreciate something of the vileness of sin, but it wasn’t only in becoming sin that Christ humbled himself.
Paul, when describing Christ’s incarnation, writes that he “emptied himself,” took “the form of a servant,” and “being found in human form, he humbled himself” (Phil. 2:6-8).
To Christ, humanity meant humility. To Christ, becoming human was to empty himself of His glory, his beauty, his riches, his perfection, his authority as God.
- Imagine a king, swapping a royal robe, sown with gold thread and all finery, for the flea-infested rags of a beggar;
- Imagine sacrificing perfect health and beauty to bear the foul and nauseating disease of an infirm, broken, and dying person;
- Imagine having your every desire come to pass, or the mightiest of angels anxiously waiting to carry out your smallest wish, and then subjecting yourself to a teenage girl who probably couldn’t even read;
- Imagine leaving the halls of heaven for a crude manger in a dark, dank cave;
- Imagine surrendering perfect communion with God himself to endure the company of 12 men who couldn’t put a coherent thought together, much less grasp even the least of heavenly concepts;
If we can imagine this as our life, then we have barely even scratched the surface in understanding what humanity meant to Christ.
The manger meant the cross
In chapters two of Luke and Matthew, we read of the angels singing, shepherds praising, and wise men worshipping. But Christ, he approached the manger knowing full well this was the first step to the cross.
Jesus’s Jerusalem began in Bethlehem. Once he was laid in that manger, he knew that in no time at all he would be laid out on the Cross, bleeding and broken for the sins of his children. Mary’s hands wrapping him in swaddling clothes would soon be the rough hands of Roman soldiers tearing his robe from him. His small, infant hands would shortly be nailed to a tree; the same hands that fashioned the world from nothing would bleed for the redemption of man.
Birth for the immortal Christ, was death. Immanuel (Is. 7:14; “God with us”) meant for Christ Eloi Eloi lama sabachthani (Mat. 27:46; “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”).
Angels and men praised and glorified God that night. They sang the beginning of man’s salvation. They caroled the birth of a Redeemer. But I wonder what passed between the Godhead as the Son took his leave of the Father and the Spirit to be joined with man’s flesh and from there, separated from the Trinity on Calvary’s cross.
We have much to celebrate when we commemorate the nativity of Christ. There is plenty of reason to rejoice. But while we’re busy singing carols, baking cookies, fellowshipping with family and friends around a feast, and passing presents, let’s not forget what this moment meant for Christ. Let’s not forget what Christ’s birth gave us. But let’s also not forget what Bethlehem cost him. Let us remember and be truly grateful.