Jesus is for life, not just for Christmas….

Christmas – it’s about more than a baby in a manger…..

It’s easy at this time of the year to be swept up in the images conjured up by “Away in a Manger”.  There’s the baby Jesus; clean, warm and cosy in the stable.  His mother Mary, angelic and smiling. Joseph gazing wonderously into the crib with donkeys, cattle, oxen around lit by a warm glow of candlelight.  Even those who don’t consider themselves ‘religious’ like the heart-warming story of the nativity. A baby born at the end of a difficult journey; a massive star and multitudes of angels appearing in the sky, gifts from exotic visitors. It’s all very lovely, safe, warm and as cosy as chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

Then by Boxing Day it’s forgotten.  Within a couple of weeks the tree comes down, the decorations are put back into the loft for another year and half the presents are packed up ready to be returned to the shops and exchanged for things we really wanted. We all get on with life and forget about the baby in the manger.

I find it fascinating that we quite often leave Jesus as a baby.  We forget that he learned to walk, talk, grew up, had a childhood with brothers and sisters, made friends, played games, cried, laughed, climbed trees, swam in rivers, sat in the sun, maybe took cover from the rain, learned a trade and for 30 years lived a life of obscurity in a small town effectively in the middle of nowhere.

In my mind I can’t divorce the Nativity in the gospels from Chapter 53 of Isaiah which speaks of Jesus’ later years and the reason he came to earth.

“Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.

 Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.

 Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand. After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.”

The first section reminds us that Jesus got out of the cradle and grew up “like a tender shoot”.  One’s youth is always described as tender.  Youth is something soft and beautiful, but we are given a glimpse of Jesus’ strength of character in that he is also described as a “root in dry ground”.  This speaks not only of the physical dryness of the land in which he lived – Israel has large areas of desert and dryness and those reading this passage would have immediately identified with the difficulties of finding roots in such dry soil – but it also speaks of a metaphoric drought, a drought of the soul or spirituality.  Jesus’ later teaching often talked of those who were “thirsty” and the fact that he was “living water”.  John 7 vs 37 – 39:

“If a person is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. If a person believes in me, rivers of living water will flow out from his heart.

Roots also speak of growth, life and vitality, echoing his words in John 10 vs 10:

“I have come that you might have life.”

Possibly my favourite section is in the next few verses where we are told that Jesus was despised and rejected by men, that he was a man of suffering and familiar with pain.  This rejection started even before he was born.  I often wonder how it was that Mary and Joseph ended up in a stable.  We are told in Luke’s gospel that due to a census each man had to return to the town of his ancestors and so Joseph and Mary had that epic 70 mile journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem whilst she was heavily pregnant.  It’s pure circumspection on my part, but I imagine that Joseph might have still had family in Bethlehem and hoped to stay with them while the census was carried out.  But, on arrival, with his heavily pregnant wife perhaps they weren’t welcome.  Perhaps they weren’t welcome because everyone in the family had heard about Joseph’s betrothed being pregnant and wouldn’t accept or believe that she hadn’t been with another man. Today, this is also a common thought and harks right back to the first verse of Isaiah 53: “Who has believed our message?” The baby Mary was carrying was rejected and despised from the start, but it is this rejection, which makes Jesus so wonderful.  This rejection makes him “a man of suffering and familiar with pain”.  This gives Jesus a unique insight into humankind.  He knows our deepest hurts and therefore he’s totally able to empathise with our own emotions of upset and pain. Only someone who is both human and divine can both understand and heal those kinds of hurt.

And yet, today, we still hold him in low esteem just as the prophet Isaiah foretold thousands of years ago.  Today Jesus’ name is used as a casual throw-away word when someone stubs their toe or is mildly surprised by something.  Is this any way to treat someone who bore our punishment, as described in the next section of the chapter?  Jesus was pierced and crushed and punished for us!  He became the sacrifice for our sins, he chose to take the iniquity of us all, it was laid on him, so that we might be forgiven. His death was, in some way, the backdrop to his life on this earth.  There was a hint right at his birth, even in the stable, where one of the Wise Men brings myrrh as a gift. In those days, myrrh was used to embalm the dead bodies of the very wealthy –royalty- and so we see that even at his birth Jesus was a King whose death was important.

But one cannot think about Jesus’ birth, life and death on this earth without, of course, mentioning his resurrection, which I feel the final section of this chapter talks about:

“After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.”

To me, this speaks of Jesus’ resurrection – seeing the light of life after he has suffered.  He will justify many.  His death pays the price for our sins, so God looks on Jesus’ death as the punishment for us and we are therefore justified by his death and we get to share the spoils – we get Christmas presents every day of the year!  Simply by believing in him we get to share in his victory over death. Finally, Jesus is raised to be seated at God’s right hand – a portion among the great – because he poured out his life unto death.  Jesus came to this earth to die and justify us in God’s sight.  He was always willing to do it, he knew that was what he had come here to accomplish and that is why he cried out on the cross:

“IT is finished!”

What began in a wooden crib, finished on a wooden cross.  A most remarkable birth, life and death.  Don’t hide your face from Jesus and hold him in low esteem. Jesus lives today and wants to share the spoils with you. Jesus wants to give you the gift of eternal life – quite literally the gift that keeps on giving!  So, as you view the nativity scene again today, look past the manger, the animals and the straw. Don’t pack it all away with the baubles and tinsel.  Look and think about the baby born to live and die for you.