Advent Devotional, December 7

Much is made of the humble circumstances of Jesus’ birth, and rightly so. It would be extraordinary that God should humble himself to the condition of human infancy, even if that human infant was wrapped in purple linen and placed in the palace’s finest bed. But swaddling clothes? A manger? A makeshift “nursery?”
And the humility of it all is made so explicit that it seems like it must be the point. Jesus would brook no half-measures. He’d come to play a critical role and he wasn’t going to mumble any of his lines. If he was to be one of us then he’d be such a one as any one of us might relate to. If he was going to die for us he was going to suffer such a death as would kill any one of us. And if he was going to be a Savior he was going to provide such a salvation as would save any one of us.
Let us follow him in the same manner in which he has led us - without half-measures, wholeheartedly, with the sort of commitment that leaves nothing back. 

John 3:16

Prayer: I have often been guilty of hedging when it comes to you. I’ve obeyed, yes, but often in such a way that I was comforted by the knowledge that disobedience was still an option. Help me to be as radically saved as Jesus was radically human.

Song: This version of “Cradle Hymn,” the words of which were written by Isaac Watts is from what may be the most played Christmas album in the Tate home. The song is addressed to a sleeping baby and compares the condition of that child with the Christ child. But any of us who are struggling to sleep and being weighed down by a burden of care might imagine this song being sung to us. 

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