You Know What’s Crazy About Christmas?

You know what’s crazy about Christmas? It’s not Black Friday, the mall, traffic, my weight gain, or Jack Frost. It’s Jesus!!

Consider the words of Philip Yancey:

It took courage to endure the shame, and courage even to risk descent to a planet known for its clumsy violence, among a race known for rejecting its prophets. A God of all power deliberately put himself in such a state that Satan could tempt him, demons could taunt him, and lowly human beings could slap his face and nail him to a cross. What more foolhardy thing could God have done? 

The Creator of the cosmos became the created. The one who holds the universe in place became the one who needed to be held and cuddled. The giver of life became the one who needed his mom for life. The infinite became finite. The light of the world had come into the world, yet the world did not know him (Jn. 1:9-10).

George MacDonald put it beautifully:

They were looking for a king
To slay their foes and lift them high,
Thou cam’st a little baby thing
That made a woman cry.

Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Phil 2:6-8).

It can be easy for us to lose sight of the craziness of the King of Kings becoming a servant of servants. We can plow through Christmas and allow the familiarity of Jesus’ birth to blunt the wonder of it. What a risk God took to become one of us! And all for our redemption.

As we go about our final weeks of Christmas mania, let’s be sure and meditate upon the true craziness of the season; the craziness of the Word becoming flesh and dwelling among us (Jn 1:14). And as we do, let’s allow this story, the Christmas story, to rewrite our story!