Have you seen these billboards around town? Aren’t you glad this was not our Savior’s mantra? If it were, where would we be?
Rather, He humbled Himself… laid aside His divine, heavenly privileges… to take on our flesh and live among us. He was birthed in a place where animals are kept… to a teenage girl whose premarital pregnancy seemed, shall we say, ill-advised and less than proper. Since his mother was poor, He was wrapped in strips of cloth. Because there was no room for Him, His first bed was a feeding trough. Smelly shepherds from the other side of the tracks were the first to be told of His arrival. Not how He would have come if He had loved Himself first.
And what of the Father? He so loved the WORLD, that He gave His only Son. In love He predestined US for adoption to sonship. This was because of His great love with which He loved US. Because of His mercy, He saved US. Is that love-yourself-first love? Hardly.
I want a billboard that says, The Kindness and Love of God our Savior appeared to us in the m-a-n-g-e-r.
Merry Christmas, friends!
Want to let these truths sink in deeper? Spend some time this Christmas reading the Scripture texts that prompted this devotional: Philippians 2:5-8; John 1:14; Luke 2:1-20; John 3:16; Ephesians 1:4-5; Ephesians 2:4-5; Titus 3:4-5.