A few thoughts for this Christmas ...

A few thoughts for this Christmas ...

“This Christmas, remember the innocent children of Bethlehem, and count the cost. Welcome Jesus into your life, knowing it could cost you your life, invite strangers to see Jesus, knowing that by so doing, your children could be killed. And do it with great joy, for you are looking for the redemption of Israel, the light of the gentiles and the kingdom of God. Because Jesus is worthy.”

in Matthew 2:10 we read; "When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route. When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: "Out of Egypt I called my son." When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: "A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more."

This sits uncomfortably with Luke’s account of an earlier incident;

"And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger." Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests." … The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told."

The shepherds were told of good news of great joy, and returned glorifying and praising God, yet the first external consequence of Jesus coming to earth was the murder of Jewish children. The angels proclaimed glad tidings of good news, yet that same village would be devastated because they received Jesus that night. God warned Joseph, but no warning was given to the other parents in that village. Had Jesus not come, those children would not have died. Were the shepherds right to praise and glorify God that night?

Another point needs to be made here. Herod only knew about the birth because God sent a star to invite foreigners to the occasion. Had God not chosen to invite gentiles to the birth, Jewish children would not have died. Tragically, this makes sense. Jesus came to break down the wall dividing Jews and gentiles (“But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility”), and as gentiles, we rejoice, and see that as something extremely positive. But that wall had been placed there by God to protect Israel.

It was indeed this idea of breaking down the barrier, of the inclusion of the Gentiles which so upset the Jewish people. In Luke 4, Jesus is handed the scroll in the synagogue, and everyone listens to him. It is only when he speaks of God blessing the Gentiles that they are enraged. Likewise Paul in the Temple, when he speaks to the crowd in Hebrew (not Aramaic), everyone is silent. "Then the Lord said to me, 'Go; I will send you far away to the Gentiles.' The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices and shouted, "Rid the earth of him! He's not fit to live!" (Acts 22:21-22)

It is the breaking down of the dividing wall between Jew and Gentile which offends them, for they see that wall as protecting them. With Jesus coming to earth, that process has begun. Why were the babies murdered in Bethlehem? Because God used a star to invite Gentiles to his birth. Had the wise men not come, those children would not have died. As Gentiles, we rejoice that the wall is gone, but within 40 years of Jesus’ death, Jerusalem was destroyed and the Jewish people scattered to the four corners of the earth.

So again, I ask, was the coming of Jesus good news of great joy for those Jewish shepherds, and for those children of Bethlehem?

The Christmas story continues; Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ. Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying: "Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel."

Jesus did not come simply as another prophet. The role of the prophet was to build the wall up, and if necessary, to stand himself in the gap. Ezekiel 22:30 "I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none.”

Of the messiah, however, we read; Micah 2:13 " One who breaks open the way will go up before them; they will break through the gate and go out. Their king will pass through before them, the LORD at their head."

The original simile has been described as follows, “After the sheep had been confined all night in the makeshift sheepfold, the animals are anxious to break out. In the morning the shepherd will knock down a section of the pilled up stones. He will break open the barricade wall which penned up the sheep all night in a protective enclosure. Anxious to be released from the holding pen, the sheep will rush out as quickly as possible, knocking down more stones from the makeshift fence in order to break outside.”
Rather than building up the wall, Jesus breaks it down. Why? Because the wall was there to protect the sheep during the night. All who came before were thieves and robbers, but with the coming of Jesus, the light has come, [Malachi 4:2 “But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings. And you will go out and leap like calves released from the stall.”] and now he breaks down the wall and is himself the door. . As Matthew 11:12 says; “the kingdom of heaven is breaking forth, and everyone breaks forth with it.” For Jesus is the breach; “the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain (that is, through His flesh)”. Hebrews 10:20.

Just as many Jewish children were drowned in the Nile, and only Moses saved, because he was beautiful to God, so here. Both Moses and Jesus were saved while other children died. But they were saved in order to be saviours. They were saved not because God did not care about those other children, but precisely because he did care about them. We need to know that such suffering matters to God, that he does not ignore it.

Exodus 3:7-8 The LORD said, "I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them”

Matthew 2:17-18 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: "A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more."

God heard their cry, knew their tears, included them in his Holy Word - that was why he sent a saviour. Pain such as this was one reason why Jesus was coming in the first place. Paul tells us; “God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ.” Jesus was breaking into this world to defeat Satan, restore the broken relationship between God and humanity, and to bless his people Israel. This is what God intervening to rescue us looks like. It is a struggle and will from its inception involve unacceptable losses, losses that cannot be comforted, yet God does not minimize the grief, but owns it in his word. This pain never finds him uncaring, but goes to his very heart, and “God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (Revelation 7:17) He was sent for the consolation of Israel.

Jesus himself is very clear on this, we need to understand the cost up front. “Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”

In any event, those children in Bethlehem died because Jesus came to include the Gentiles.
Because God is God over all the earth.
Because this was his promise to Abraham.

All this remains true today! In this past years, children in Syria and Iraq and Nigeria and Afghanistan have died because Jesus came into their lives. Like the children of Bethlehem, had Jesus not entered their lives, they would not have died. In the case of missionary children Rode and Jean-Pierre Groenewald (who were murdered by the Taliban in 2014), had they not been in Afghanistan, inviting strangers into the kingdom, they would not have died. Would we join with Judas and ask; why this waste? Or would we join with them in praising God that yes, he has come into their lives?

The eldest teenager, Jean-Pierre Groenewald gave his own answer in a blog he wrote only weeks before he was murdered;

“This all has to do with having ‘counted the cost’ of living here. If you’re going to be constantly paranoid that you’re going to die if you go out, then there’s no point in being here. … There are tough times, yes, but the satisfaction of knowing you’re where God wants you to be, is more than a good reason to be here, to go through the tough times. … All in all, I love this country. I love the life I’m living. I wouldn’t change any of it, even if I could. I’ve grown in myself, and in God. The tough times are only temporary, but God is there permanently and He is constantly blessing us. … We flew low over the mountains and had a smooth approach to the runway. Right before we touched down, I said out-loud, "Ahh, Home." To add to that, it was a pretty soft touch down too. Thanks Captain!

And thanks to my Captain as well. I live my life for Him, and will always follow anything He orders me to do.

Thanks for reading and may God Bless you in everything you do!”

While Jesus insists we know about the cost, it is Peter who affirms that the cost is worth it, that Jesus coming is indeed a reason for unspeakable joy.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade--kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith--of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire--may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things. Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.”

So this Christmas, remember the innocent children of Bethlehem, and count the cost. Welcome Jesus into your life, knowing it could cost you your life, invite strangers to see Jesus, knowing that by so doing, your own children could be killed. And do it with great joy, for you are looking for the redemption of Israel, the light of the gentiles and the kingdom of God. Because Jesus is worthy.