Christmas - I don't get it

The birth of Jesus. Does it make sense? Why so much attention paid to His birth, both in the bible and in Christian cultures?

See, I get the cross. The cross is the central theme of God’s atonement for our sin. I look at Jesus on the cross and the suffering He endured on my behalf and it makes sense. It makes sense to meditate upon His work at the cross.

The birth of Jesus - I don’t get it as much. I don’t have as much reason to meditate upon it. What significance does His birth have?

Recently, as I pondered the questions above, I tried to think about the perspective of the wise men who came to find Jesus. From their perspective, they had no idea who He was. They didn’t know who they’d find. Rich. Poor. Known. Unknown. Who could he be? They really had no clue. They simply followed God’s leading at the star. To them, He was a mystery. And, the other interesting thing is that they were presumably from another religion in the east. Or, maybe they were Jews living in another area. It doesn’t really say. Of course, we don’t know, but what I do know is that they were walking in the dark. They had no idea what their travels would find. It left Jesus mysterious, as He should be. Just as a woman longs to draw a man to her partially through her mysteriousness, so God longs to draw the entire human race to Him partly through His mysteriousness as well. Of course, I’m not talking about hiddenness or fickleness or self-protection. No, I’m talking about a healthy form of mystery that draws us in for the ultimate purpose of being known. God longs to be known and He will reveal Himself to us, but part of how He draws us in is through the seductiveness of mystery.

So, in thinking about the Christmas tradition and the yearly celebration of the birth of Christ, I am brought to a place where I become like one of the wise men of long ago. They had no idea who he would be. And here is the anaglogy: When I ponder the birth of Christ at Christmas this year, I think about the fact that I don’t know who He will be in the year to come. Now, I’m not saying that Jesus literally becomes a new person, but I am saying that we don’t know what He will bring in the year to come. It isn’t that who He is literally changes, but who I perceive Him to be changes over time. In this sense, I’m taking some license. When I think about the birth of Christ this Christmas, I don’t know who He will be next year. I don’t know who I will come into contact with. I don’t know what new personality traits I will discover. I don’t know what new expressions of power and love or sadness and suffering He will bring. In essence, even though I know Him and even though He never really changes in reality, who He is next year remains a mystery to me.

I long to know who He is next year. His mystery draws me in. I want to know Him, and this Christmas season I will travel to find this babe. Who will I find?