“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6). We always remember that Jesus died for us, but sometimes we forget how important it is that He was born for us. Obviously He would need to first be born to be able to then die for our sins, but Jesus voluntarily submitting Himself to all of the weaknesses and indignities of a mortal body was as much if not more of a sacrifice than His eventual death. Jesus is the Jehovah of the Old Testament. By Him the worlds were and are created. It was not necessary for His own sake for Christ to be born. He did it for us. He gave up limitless power and placed Himself in a mortal body, where at first He had not the power to feed Himself or sit up or anything. And He was born for us not once, but twice. When Jesus approached John the Baptist to be baptized and born again, “John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffered him.” (Matthew 3:14-15). A key component of the ordinance of baptism is the remission of sins. But Christ was sinless. He did not need to be born again, just as He had not needed to be born the first time. Just like Jesus, there are plenty of things that we all must endure that are not necessary or beneath our dignity or completely unfair and undeserved. We have every legal and moral right to stiffen our neck and dig in our heels and refuse to be subjected to such indignities. But we can choose instead to follow the example of Jesus, who for us was born a child and submitted willingly as a child to all things which His Father saw fit to inflict upon Him. As we celebrate this Christmas the birth of this child, let us remember that Christ stripped Himself of all of His power and glory and entered this world naked and screaming and vulnerable beyond belief, just like all of us, to show us what true humility looks like so that we can follow His example in our own imperfect but hopefully willing way.
