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[Luke2]

I am amazed! May god bless and keep this people and continue making a light unto the world of them.

The US anthem almost has God as an after thought. Canada and Mexico address the country itself as if it were a person with God playing a supporting role.

New Zealand has two anthems; this one and God save the Queen as they are part of the UK. Both anthems are prayers to God not to their country and both are profound, in my view.

Thank you for sharing this video.

[Luke2]

Okay, I am wrestling with my own thoughts on Jesus. I have no doubt that He is my Lord and my God to whom I owe my very existence. His pre-existence before His conception in Mary’s womb is not something I have any doubts about. He is the Word spoken by God that brought about creation and upholds it still. There is so much to God that is beyond my understanding that I don’t waste energy attempting to understand it. The things that I can wrap my mind around boggles me enough without getting frustrated trying to understand the unexplainable.

But I do search out the things I can understand and seek to learn more all the time. One thing (among many) that you and I can agree on is that Jesus the man was exactly that – A man, a mere human being. A helpless infant who went hungry until someone fed him, who needed his diapers changed until he was toilet trained, who had to crawl until he learned to walk.

A little boy who heard about the circumstances of his birth, second hand, from Mary and Joseph. A boy who learned about the Messiah from hearing adult conversations, A young student who learned about himself as he learned the scriptures and learned to hide them in his heart. A boy who began to realize that the Messiah wasn’t coming as the great and glorious conquering King but as the suffering servant.

I was reviewing the list of desired character traits of the Godly man. At the bottom of the list is this phrase: Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.

I believe the mystery is the very real humanity of Jesus. A solid, three dimensional, down to earth humanity of Jesus. Jesus, in the flesh. I keep exalting Him because He is worthy of all honor and glory and praise. But in exalting Him I often, too often tend to overlook his humanity.

His incarnation was not a shadow play. not a Potemkin village or a false front to fool an audience until the play is complete. When He became a man, he became a man for all of eternity. I had understood that He became flesh and dwelt among us and that during that time He had emptied Himself of His Godhood and became totally like us, yet without sin, (both in His birth and in the life He lived.) I had assumed that after His resurrection and ascent into glory; that He took up estate as God once again.

I wrote something for myself as a meditation on Jesus. I would appreciate insight and comments.

Jesus was in all ways a human being. This is the mystery of Godliness.

He had no more power than any of us but He learned total dependance on His Father for every word that He spoke and every action that He took. He exercised no power of His own, but relied on the Holy Spirit.

This youngster, before He was born, was already written of in the volume of the book!

By His study of the book, He came to learn about Himself, and He learned things that He must have quailed at and yet he grew in Spirit and stature and Godliness. I imagine that it was both frightening and overwhelming for this boy as He came to understand that the Messiah must first come, not as a triumphant and glorious King which almost everyone around Him was expecting.

He probably learned about the strange circumstances surrounding His birth, at his mother’s knee, and began to get understanding of the implications. He also probably learned about the coming King when hearing the adults talk together. What boy wouldn’t have his imagination captured by the idea of the great and glorious conqueror. (I know that as a boy I often imagined that I could swing through the trees like Tarzan, or be a mighty super hero like Clark Kent, or be knight of the round table, my imagination let me play many heroic roles, but I didn’t have anything in reality to support my imaginary roles.

I wasn’t a descendant of David. My birth wasn’t announced by angels. No Magi bearing gifts came to pay their respects. My parents weren’t told to go to Egypt to protect me. I didn’t have a mad king slaughter all the boys two years and younger in the village of my birth.. No heavenly agent appeared to tell my parents the coast was clear and bring me back to Israel. My cousin and I may have born some months apart but there was no supernatural element involved. Nothing in the circumstances of my life gave me cause to believe I might be a longed for and often prophesied Savior of my people.) But Jesus actually had reason to believe that He was that great King. I can imagine Him coming to the realization that He was not come as the conquering King but as the Suffering Servant. A scorned man, rejected by His own, betrayed and abandoned, cruelly beaten and then hung upon a tree. I imagine that the boy must have needed comforting and counseling often.

And Who alone could provide that encouragement?

The Father must have shown Jesus things to come, as a result of His suffering and shame, but only if He set His face like iron and moved forward to endure the Cross.

What a marvelous glory must He have shown Jesus to encourage Him to look beyond the horrible suffering and rejection to a incredible situation. One which enabled Him to actually scorn the suffering set before Him in order to obtain the reward. A reward that would free all of Gods creation from the curse of sin and death.

By His obedience even to the point of enduring the cross, He won a victory for the entire human race and wrested creation out of the hands of Satan. He obtained a ministry more excellent than the earthly priesthood. A better covenant with better promises. Promises that He has been both charged with keeping and empowered to bring about.

While He is continually mediating before the throne for all of his people, He is also preparing a place for us and He is readying to return to earth, in the flesh, with the victory of a fully restored and new creation.

A creation that is no longer groaning for the restoration of mankind, but rejoicing as the human race is not only restored but actually elevated even higher than the original estate we had been created for under Adam.

This is the mystery but there is more.

He could have easily have replaced this fallen creation with something else, but God, of His own free will, out of love for a creation, elected to divest Himself of His Godness and become a mere human being like James Smith or Jane Doe or Jose Imanez. He became Jesus, just another guy and a not very impressive looking guy at that., who had no more supernatural power than was available to anyone else. This homely little man won salvation for the entire human race. (All who choose to accept it.) And salvation for the creation that was brought low by man’s fall. By winning through to the victory Jesus won the crown and received His reward. He is installed at the right hand of the Father, His name is exalted above all names. He has earned, for humanity’s sake, a priesthood that is more efficacious than the one established by Moses.

He is still a man, still a human being, depending on the Father and the Holy Spirit and not his own power! Exalted and glorified and honored and praised. Yet He still elects to be as we are so that He might continue to be our great high priest. One who understands because He has been tempted in all ways just as we are and knows our weakness because He is weak. .

At what point will He take up His Godhood and the estate He held before His incarnation? Never? Or only after He has brought us with Him to an unimaginable elevation? Is He currently fully human and fully God; no longer reliant on the Father and the Holy Spirit but able to act in His own power. Is the power of the name of Jesus empowered by the Father or by the Son or the Holy Spirit?

I think Jesus is still reliant on the power of the Holy Spirit and depending on the Father for counsel and comfort. I think that He still has work to do and is doing it as the man Christ Jesus. Glorified, yes, But glorified just as we will be glorified for His names sake. He has yet to bring all things under His dominion and present them to the Father. He will do these things and He will do them as a man. No wonder Satan thinks he has a chance of winning. He doesn’t have much respect for human beings. (and with justification, considering our record.) But He is no match for the man Christ Jesus, who defeated him on the cross and will complete the task in due time.

Jesus has much yet to do, He will complete His work as a human being not as God. As He completes His work and moves forward and upward He will bring us with Him. He chose to become Human for our sake and He will always be human. And yet we will be there, when He takes His throne and all of heaven worships Him and sings
Holy, Holy, Holy…Lord God Almighty.

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