Have you ever paused to consider what a great act of setting down power the birth of Christ truly is? It is bravery; it is letting go of all comfort and relying on a corrupted humanity to care for and raise God’s self from a baby to a man. I cannot begin to imagine how difficult it must have been! In coming to this earth, God laid down all power to become a dependent baby—imagine what the heavenly host must have been thinking…
Angel 1: Have you heard what is going to happen? A baby! I can’t believe it; what could God possibly be thinking?
Angel 2: I know! Who would voluntarily go down there, to a place filled with people who don’t seem all that grateful for what they have? Does God really think it is going to be a warm welcome?
Angel 1: Maybe; but what about this baby business? It is one thing to go down there and interact with them on their level, but why as a baby? Why go and become completely dependant on them for survival and growth?
Angel 2: Well, I guess that’s probably the point, right? To prove to these people once and for all that God is willing to go to any length to display the depth and truth of the greatest love that has ever existed?
Angel 1: But still, don’t you think it is a little odd to give up all of that power? Wouldn’t the same result come from God entering the scene as an adult, or even a young boy?
Angel 2: No…
Jesus: I have to go as a baby. I have to experience life as they experience it. Their joys, their pains, their love; I have to feel it all so they can see how much I love them. We have tried everything else and nothing has worked. I need to live a full life, so that they may have true life in abundance.
You see, God did not view it as giving up power, but as another step in an unceasing effort for us to understand just how far God is willing to go to make sure that we know what it is to be God’s child. Jesus may have been born a baby, but as powerless as he was, he held the greatest power of all. The very least we can do this season is remember the trying lengths to which he went so that we might hear him say “I love you”.
(Note: the above is original content written by this author in 2004. I suggest having a journal and Bible on-hand when you sit down with this devotional in order to complete the full aspects of it.)