Luke 2:12 And this shall be a sign to you; You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. Let us think what is the connection here. A sign — a signal: how so? In what sense did the mode and circumstance of the birth make it typical of the thing which Christ comes to do? What is that thing which Christ comes to do? He has come to be the God-man, the Redeemer, the Emmanuel, and the Saviour — the God for us, and God with us, and God in us — of the fallen, the sinful, the erring and straying man. Now, to be this, He must first incorporate Himself with men, take the flesh and blood, the nature and body and spirit of the race which He comes to save. He must first of all incorporate Himself — not with a man, or a few men, but with humanity — with man as man, and not with certain privileged specimens and choice individuals of the race. He has come to undo the fall. He has come to bear the sins, to wipe away the tears, to take the sting out of the death of the Adam race as a whole; therefore He must not only take flesh and blood — become one of us and live our very life: that is not enough. He must go down to the very rock from which we are hewn, and He must put on our nature — not in its ornamental but in its bare form — not as it may deck itself in the embellishment of rank or wealth, of social distinction or philosophical culture, but as it is in itself and in the commonest experiences of its humblest children. If the Divine Saviour had appeared in any other form than this, He would have misled men as to the thing which He came to do, and as to the relation in which He desired to stand as to the lower and the lowest portions of the human family. The sign of the helpless babe and the manger cradle was no capricious or accidental idea; for, inasmuch as it is Christ the Lord, therefore ye shall find Him not in the miraculous strength of an instantaneous maturity, and not in the guest-chambers of a king's palace, but as a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. There was a connection and a congruity between the sign and the reality; for thus it was that Christ became, not the faith of a few, but the Saviour of all. None are poorer, none are humbler, none are less learned, none are less noble after the flesh, than He. None can say now, "His is the religion of the educated — of the philosophical — of kings and princes — His is the religion which admits or which favours a position of comfort or respectability, and I am none of these, so Christ is not for me." And when, at this Christmas season, wealth surrounds itself with all its luxuries of mind and body, and thinks it much if, for a moment and in the most perfunctory way, it remembers the poor, we feel how slight must be the hold of these self-indulgers upon the faith which they profess to honour. If we would know the mystery of Christmas; if we would read the riddle of the angel; if we would know why he said, "The Saviour is born, and the sign is the manger," we should turn our steps to some poor man's chamber with its highbacked chair and its open Bible. We shall hear that man say, "Oh, I love both to be abased and to abound. I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, for Christ the Lord was born this day for our salvation, and His first earthly resting place was a yard and a manger." (Dean Vaughan.) Parallel Verses KJV: And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. |
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