Category Archives: Christmas

On the Incarnation

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Christmas02On the Incarnation – From a sermon by Henry Law (1797-1884) entitled, “I am that I am” based on Ex. 3:14

Reader, look down now from this astounding glory and fix your eye on Bethlehem’s manger. A lowly Babe lies in the lowly cradle of a lowly town, the offspring of a lowly mother. Look again. That child is the eternal “I AM.” He whose Deity never had birth, is born “the woman’s Seed.” He, whom no infinitudes can hold, is contained within infant’s age, and infant’s form. He, who never began to be, as God, here begins to be, as man. And can it be, that the great “I AM THAT I AM” shrinks into our flesh, and is little upon our earth, as one newborn of yesterday? It is so. The Lord promised it. Prophets foretold it. Types prefigured it. An angel announces it. Heaven rings with rapture at it. Faith sees it. The redeemed rejoice in it.

But why is this wonder of wonders? Why is eternity’s Lord a child of time? He thus stoops, that He may save poor wretched sinners such as we are. Could He not by His will or by His word? Ah! No. He willed, and all things were. He speaks, and all obey. But He must die, as man, that a lost soul may live. To rescue from one stain of sin, the Eternal must take the sinner’s place, and bear sin’s curse and pay sin’s debt, and suffer sin’s penalty, and wash out sin’s filth, and atone for sin’s malignity.

“I AM THAT I AM” alone could do this. “I AM THAT I AM” alone has done it. What self-denial, what self-abasement, what self-emptying is here! Surely, royalty in rags, angels in cells, is no descent compared to Deity in flesh! But mighty love moves Jesus to despise all shame, and to lie low in misery’s lowest mire. Through ages past His “delights were with the sons of men.” Prov. 8.31.

The Incarnation

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The Incarnation: What We Celebrate at Christmas

In this excerpt from “What Did Jesus Do?,” R.C. Sproul reminds us what we really celebrate at Christmas—the incarnation of God Himself.

The Incarnation: What We Celebrate at Christmas

What we celebrate at Christmas is not so much the birth of a baby, as important as that is, but what’s so significant about the birth of that particular baby is that in this birth we have the incarnation of God Himself. An incarnation means a coming in the flesh. We know how John begins His gospel, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” So in that very complicated introductory statement, he distinguishes between the Word and God, and then in the next breath identifies the two, “The Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And then at the end of the prologue, he says, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Now in this “infleshment,” if you will, of Christ appearing on this planet, it’s not that God suddenly changes through a metamorphosis into a man, so that the divine nature sort of passes out of existence or comes into a new form of fleshiness. No, the incarnation is not so much a subtraction as it is an addition, where the eternal second person of the Trinity takes upon Himself a human nature and joins His divine nature to that human nature for the purpose of redemption.

In the 19th century, liberal scholars propounded a doctrine called the kenotic theory of the incarnation, and you may have heard it, the idea being that when Jesus came to this earth, He laid aside His divine attributes so that the God-man at least touching His deity no longer had the divine attributes of omniscience, omnipotence, and all the rest. But of course, that would totally deny the very nature of God, who is immutable. Even in the incarnation, the divine nature does not lose His divine attributes. He doesn’t communicate them to the human side. He doesn’t deify the human nature, but in the mystery of the union between the divine and the human natures of Jesus, the human nature is truly human. It’s not omniscient. It’s not omnipotent. It’s none of those things. But at the same time, the divine nature remains fully and completely divine. B. B. Warfield, the great scholar at Princeton, in remarking on the kenotic theory of his day said, “The only kenosis that that theory proves is the kenosis of the brains of the theologians who are propagating it.”—that they’ve emptied themselves of their common sense.

But in any case, what is emptied is glory, privilege, exaltation. Jesus in the incarnation makes Himself of no reputation. He allows His own divine exalted standing to be subjected to human hostility and human criticism and denial. He took the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men. This is an amazing thing that He doesn’t just come as a man, He comes as a slave. He comes in a station that carries with it no exaltation, no dignity, only indignity. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient even to the point of death, the shameful death of the cross.

A Virgin Shall Be With Child

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the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel (God with us).” Isaiah 7:14

Larry King of CNN fame was once asked, “Who would you have most liked to have interviewed in human history and what would you ask them?” Without hesitating at all, he answered, “Jesus of Nazareth, and I would ask Him, ‘Were You born of a virgin?'” He went on to say that the answer to this question is the most important in history.

I agree.

Humanity’s greatest need is atonement and for that we need a sacrifice that is acceptable to God, one that is flawless and perfect. Only a perfect sacrifice is acceptable in God’s eyes. That is why Mr. King’s question reveals a profound insight. If Jesus was born of a virgin, He is the Son of God; if not, he is just a man like us, and not able to provide us with redemption. If Joseph was Jesus’ real father after all, then all of Christ’s claims lie in shambles and ruins. Jesus would have been born with a sin nature just like ours, and even if He had lived a perfect sin-free life, would be in no state to be the spotless Lamb without blemish, and if that is true, He would be in no position to atone for his own sins, let alone someone else’s.

Each Christmas we hear the story about angels and shepherds, of wise men and strange sightings of a star, of a donkey, and of the Child that was laid in a stable manger. Yet the actual birth of Jesus, though highly unusual, was not entirely unique. Of course, not everyone is born to the sight of a star moving and coming to rest overhead, or to the sound of angelic announcements and trumpet blasts! Yet it is true to say that many children have been born in humble surroundings. Therefore, it was the manner in which Jesus was conceived that marks Him out from others. The doctrine of the Virgin Birth holds that Jesus’ birth was the result of a miraculous conception whereby the Virgin Mary conceived a baby in her womb by the power of the Holy Spirit, without a human father. Christ’s miraculous birth tells us much about His nature. Because He was born of a woman, He was indeed human, and therefore, one of us. That is, one of us in every way, except one. We are born with original sin and Christ was not.

The miracle of the Virgin Birth reveals Christ’s perfect humanity and also points us to His majestic Deity. Notice that the announcement of the angel Gabriel to Mary includes the statement that “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35).

Of course, in the ordinary course of nature, a virgin birth is impossible. But the angel Gabriel finishes his announcement to Mary by saying, “For with God nothing will be impossible.” (Luke 1:37)

Christianity is supernatural or it is nothing. It is based, not simply on Christ’s teaching, miracles or morals, but on the Person of Christ Himself. Jesus Himself states that the revelation that “Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God,” is the bedrock upon which His Church is to be built, a Church which all the powers of hell cannot thwart (Matt. 16:18). Those who do not believe that Jesus was born of a virgin usually do not believe that Jesus is the true Son of God. Yet the message of Christmas is that God has sent His Son, born of a virgin, into our world, to save His people from their sins.

The virgin birth of Christ testifies to His Deity, setting Him apart from all others. It is therefore appropriate that He should be born in this way, since He was not implicated in sin, like all others since the Fall. Mary was not an exception in this respect, any more than David or Peter, though her sins are not recorded as theirs were. Through His death, Jesus became her Savior and the Savior of all those who would believe in Him.