Just a Moment

This past Monday in our weekly staff meeting, Karen Sherman, one of our administrative assistants, shared the following excerpt from Max Lucado's book God Came Near.  It is a powerful reminder of how far God stooped to take on humanity in the person of Jesus Christ.

"It all happened in a moment, a most remarkable moment.

As moments go, that one appeared no different than any other.  If you could somehow pick it up off the timeline and examine it, it would look exactly like the ones that have passed while you have read these words.  It came and it went.  It was preceded and succeeded by others just like it.  It was one of the countless moments that have marked time since eternity became measurable.

But in reality, that particular moment was like none other.  For through that segment of time a spectacular thing occurred.  God became a man.  While the creatures of earth walked unaware, Divinity arrived.  Heaven opened herself and placed her most precious one in a human womb.

The Omnipotent, in one instant, made himself breakable.  He who had been spirit became pierceable.  He who was larger than the universe became an embryo.  And he who sustains the world with a word chose to be dependent upon the nourishment of a young girl.

God as a fetus.  Holiness sleeping in a womb.  The creator of life being created.

God was given eyebrows, elbows, two kidneys, and a spleen.  He stretched against the walls and floated in the amniotic fluids of his mother.

God had come near.

He came, not as a flash of light or as an unapproachable conqueror, but as one whose first cries were heard by a peasant girl and a sleepy carpenter.  The hands that first held him were unmanicured, calloused, and dirty.

No silk.  No ivory.  No hype.  No party.  No hoopla.

Were it not for the shepherds, there would have been no reception.  And were it not for a group of stargazers, there would have been no gifts.

Joseph watched as Mary changed God's diaper.  The universe watched with wonder as The Almighty learned to walk.  Children played in the street with him.  And had the synagogue leader in Nazareth known was was listening to his sermons ....

Jesus may have had pimples.  He may have been tone-deaf.  Perhaps a girl down the street had a crush on him or vice versa.  It could be that his knees were bony.  One thing's for sure: He was, while completely divine, completely human.

For thirty-three years he would feel everything you and I have ever felt.  He felt weak.  He grew weary.  He was afraid of failure.  He was susceptible to wooing women.  He got colds, burped, and had body odor.  His feelings got hurt.  His feet got tired.  And his head ached.

To think of Jesus in such a light is--well, it seems almost irreverent, doesn't it?  It's not something we like to do; it's uncomfortable.  It is much easier to keep the humanity out of the incarnation.  Clean the manure from around the manger.  Wipe the sweat out of his eyes.  Pretend he never snored or blew his nose or hit his thumb with a hammer.

He's easier to stomach that way.  There is something about keeping him divine that keeps him distant, packaged, predictable.

But don't do it.  For heaven's sake, don't.  Let him be as human as he intended to be.  Let him into the mire and muck of our world.  For only if we let him in can he pull us out."