Incarnation

Incarnation

With the passing days I find that I dislike any pictorial representation of our Lord Jesus. Especially do I abominate the pictures which show Him long faced and long bearded, with a faraway look in His eyes.

It is too bad that we have become accustomed to thinking of the Lord as dressed in a long robe. In His day all men were so dressed, so that there was no difference in His dress from that of any other man. If we would truly think of Jesus as He was when He was on earth, imagine Him in a Sears Roebuck suit and a five-dollar hat, walking through Times Square, not attracting a second glance from anyone. No one would ever have given Jesus Christ a second glance if God had not sent John the Baptist to announce Him. "There standeth one among you whom ye know not" (John 1:26), was the message of the forerunner, while the Holy Spirit tells us, "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not" (John 1:10). It was only when He was proclaimed and had begun to perform wonders that the crowd came after Him. Even the crowds did not follow Him for anything in Himself though, but only because of the food that He gave them to eat (John 6:26).

If anyone is hurt by my description of the Lord as an unknown, common man, let him read the Word of God which tells us that "He hath no form nor comeliness, and there is no beauty that we should desire him" (Isa. 53:2).

It had to be thus. If the Lord had come in a form that was worthy of Him, every eye that looked upon Him would have been searedblind in its socket. Every nerve that touched Him would have withered and died in a moment. It could not have been otherwise. He is God.

When God gave the specifications for a wilderness tabernacle in which He should be worshipped, He chose a prefabricated house with a few dozen boards that could be taken apart and set up again where the Spirit led through the cloud and the fire. A few badger skins, dyed red, were flung over these boards, and a curtain was hung before the door and another one before the holy place. It had to be that simple. If God had put a temple on this earth which was worthy of His honor, it would have been a weight on this globe that would have out pulled gravity, and the sphere would have gone wobbling through the universe. So God was content with the tabernacle. And when the Lord came He was content to occupy a body that was ordinary even by human standards. Thus we know that He can understand our needs and sympathize with our littleness.

The Word was made flesh and tented among us - for thus the Greek reads (John 1:14). And this is the glory of the incarnation.

1. Why was the virgin birth the mode in which God desired to usher in His kingdom?
2. what are some attributes of God that are manifest in the humble entrance of the messiah into our world?