THE SIMPLICITY OF CHRISTMAS (Lk. 2:1-20) In his book, God s Gift of Christmas, John MacArthur wrote that Christmas has become the product of an odd mixture of pagan ideas, superstition, fanciful legends, and plain ignorance. Let s sort out what is worth emphasizing Christmas is the bold announcement Jesus Christ has come into this complex world with an amazing simplicity. And there is no need to change it, for to change it is to spoil it Have you heard the one about the man who was bothered with continual ringing in his ears, bulging eyes, and a flushed face? This went on for about three years, during which he visited doctor after doctor. One took out his tonsils, one removed his appendix, another pulled out all his teeth. Nothing seemed to help though, because he still had ringing in his ears, bulging eyes, and a flushed face. Finally, a doctor told him that there was no hope, and he only had six months to live. The poor man quit his job and decided to live life as best he could before it was over. He went to his tailor and ordered some suits and shirts. The tailor measured his neck and wrote down the size, 16. The man corrected him, 15. The tailor measured again, 16. But the man insisted he had always worn a size 15 collar. Well, all right, said the tailor, but don t come back here complaining if you have ringing in your ears, bulging eyes, and a flushed face! When someone changes the story of Christmas, and distorts what the Bible says they are like the man who insisted he had a 15 collar-line. It doesn t fit right! The simplicity of the first coming into this world of the Lord Jesus Christ stands in stark contrast with how the world s rewritten story. The place where you get the full and original account is in the Bible, - it is the only reliable source for the intricate details of how, and why, and when, and where. It is uniquely God s commentary on how, - as Charles Wesley put it, - Our God contracted to a span, Incomprehensibly made Man. It is the authoritative information concerning Jesus Christ coming into this world. First of all, Jesus is real, and the story of His birth is also real, - it is neither allegory, myth, or legend. Mary and Joseph were real people. Their historical background is accurate, - where they lived, the Roman emperor at the time, the political and religious details these are historical and verifiable accuracies. And when you invest your mind to understand, you can see Joseph knocking on the door of the innkeeper, and you can see the innkeeper taking the young
2 couple round the back to the only place he had left. And you can see the young pair, - far, far away from their home in Nazareth, - trying to settle in that place for as long as they were going to be there. I m sure they hoped it wouldn t have been too long! After all, one of the prominent features of where they were staying was a manger and the only place you would find a manger is where you would find animals and where you find animals, it is not always the most hygenic and a manger is a feeding-trough for the animals, and it would be unlikely it had been thoroughly cleaned out! So, you can imagine what kind of a place this was! It was anything but ideal and idyllic, like you would see on a Christmas card. Mary MacDonald, the Gaelic hymn writer from the Isle of Mull, wrote Child in the manger, Infant of Mary; Outcast and stranger, Lord of all; Child Who inherits all our transgressions, All our demerits on Him fall. In Heaven s glory, the Saviour never slept but He slept in the manger He never cried, but He cried in the manger. The Saviour left the glory of Heaven and immediately, He made Himself of no reputation by humbling Himself (Phil. 2:7,8), and His earthly life began in an abode only fit for animals. It was where the most famous Person ever started off, on this earth! And there has never been anyone who has been so well-known as Jesus! His Name is and has been known by kings and queens, presidents, prime ministers right down to the very poorest of people. People who have never heard of Donald Trump have heard of Jesus! No one ever has been as well known as Him! And yet, He had no royal midwife to bring Him into the world. Neither did He have surgeons on hand in case anything went wrong. Instead, all that came to see Him in that place was a handful of shepherds the lowliest of the low! And yet, that Baby in the manger is the One before Whom every knee will bow, and His Name will be confessed by every tongue. Even the arrogant who criticise or just simply ignore Him when they come to that day, they will have to bow also for the Baby in the manger is the God Who is King, Immanuel ( God with us ) Who is coming again as King.
3 And, back in Bethlehem, at the time of the year when Jesus was born, it would have been miserable in that place outside the Gospel writer describes it for us, Lk. 2:6 And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. 7 And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. That was poverty! You sometimes hear about little newborn babies being found wrapped in a blanket and left on the street Here is a young teenage couple, and Mary feels the birth pains, and she is in such as place as this. This is where life for her baby son was to begin! There wasn t much Joseph could have done to help. Basically, Mary was on her own, - Joseph could not have had the baby for her She didn t have her mother with her, or her cousin Elizabeth, or any sisters or friends she had grown up with And when the wee Child was born, she sorted out all the initial post-birth things, and lifted the Baby, wiped Him, and wrapped Him in the few clothes she was able to afford, and laid Him in the only place she could find she laid Him in a manger. If there hadn t been a manger, what? Where would she have laid Him? His Heavenly Father provided the manger. The word for manger (fa,tnh) comes from another Greek word meaning to eat, - the wooden manger is where the animals ate from. She cleaned out any residue from the animals, and any scraps left, and she made it comfortable for her baby Son. That was at the beginning of His life on earth. And there was another piece of wood waiting for Him just over thirty years later, - a wooden cross She was there too. She was there with Him all through His life, from the cradle to the cross. As His mother, - and Mary was His mother, for she gave birth to Him, - as His mother laid Him in the manger, the clothes He would have been wrapped in would have been clean but I don t think they would have been as hygenic as the clothes we would wrap our babies in When the Baby was born, she had to wash the wee Child herself but sure she was only a young girl, - what experience would she have had in seeing babies being born? I would guess, very little and she was looking after this wee Baby in a place which had some of the smelliest, filthiest, and most unsuitable conditions. But that is part and parcel of God s amazing grace for when the Son of God came down from Heaven, He came all the way
4 down! He didn t stop half-ways He didn t stop in Herod s palace. He didn t make contingency plans in case anything went wrong, or He changed His mind No, He more than humbled Himself when He went lower than anyone else in Bethlehem. Everyone else could afford their suitable accommodation, with good clean sheets to lie between, a comfortable bed, shelter from the weather outside, food to eat How many others would have left home and travelled seventy - plus miles being heavily pregnant, not knowing where they would stay or where they would eat? How many other pregnant women would have accepted a place such as this to have their first baby? The first baby sure anything could go wrong! The three of them were there, - far away from home Who would you go to if you needed someone?! And then, who did turn up but the shepherds! These were a group of people who, - because of the lowly status of their occupation, - spent most of their time out on the hills away from everyone. David was a shepherd, and it was such a lowly job, his own father forgot he had him! (cf. I Sam. 16) And these shepherds would have been working with sheep all day and all night in the hills of Judea and there were no showers or washing machines out on the hills. When they would come into your house, you would definitely know they were with the smell. But no matter what we say about these people, they were the first guests to see Jesus the night He was born. Mary and Joseph s family were back in Nazareth. Some of their way-out family were somewhere around Bethlehem and Judea but they must not have been very close, otherwise Mary and Joseph would have been staying with them. The wise men from the east were still looking at their stars Herod was in His palace The religious people were proudly trapzing about Jerusalem. The world was going on as normal the night Jesus was born and only a handful of shepherds were invited to visit Him. How did they find Jesus? How did they know where to look? Notice they did not have the same problem finding Jesus as the wise men, - the shepherds would not have been educated at all and yet, who got lost?! It was the wise men who got lost, and it was the shepherds who simply went into Bethlehem and found Jesus, Lk. 2:16 they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. The shepherds followed the signs God gave them They hurried into the town They had listened to the angels and believed
5 what they were totheir story, 15 And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. They took God at His word, without adding anything to it. That continues to be the only way to find Him. The world cannot show you Jesus, the church can point you in the right direction, but ultimately, it is the work of God which shows you the Saviour And when they found Him, here is what Luke recorded, Lk. 2:17 And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. 18 And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds. That is our remit, - to do what the shepherds did to tell it as the Word describes it. We don t add to it, for to add anything would be to take away. We don t change it, for changing it distorts and confuses the message. Like those shepherds, we simply tell it as God s Word says it. To the believer in Christ, God provides as to how He so loved the world He gave His onlybegotten Son to be our Saviour and Lord, that by believing in Him, - the Jesus of the Bible, - we would not perish forever in the flaming fires of Hell, but enjoy forever the Heaven God will bring us to. This is our Baby of Bethlehem, Who became the Man of Galilee Who died on the cross in our place, and Who rose again from the dead He is the Saviour, the Son of Mary, the Son of God, and the King of Heaven God has invested the merits of His plan of salvation completely in Him for He says in His Word, Rom. 5:8 God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. That is God s purpose for why Jesus came to Bethlehem. Simple as it is, that is how Jesus came into this world. May we keep on telling it the way His Word says it, and may it keep on changing lives for His glory! Amen.