In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while[a] Quirinius was governor of Syria.) And everyone went to their own town to register.

So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them. (Luke 2:1-7)

 

The sight of the infant Christ in the manger is the most vulnerable picture I can imagine.  Here is the Saviour of the world as a mere child who can do nothing to protect himself from the brutality of the world around him. Yet he was safe and grew to fulfill the will of God for his life.

 

Surely all heaven and hell understood the birth of this Messiah King: Heaven rejoiced and hell was thrown asunder.  Surely the devil amassed the forces of hell to launch an assault against this small child and tried to end his life through Herod before he even had a chance to grow up, but God protected him.

 

And that is the nature of God to protect the infancy of His great exploits from those who war against Him.  God will defeat our every enemy in Christ.  When we stay under the blood and look to God alone as our defense and shield, He has a way of carrying us through every storm.

 

When I think of the vulnerability of the Christ child and how God took someone who was born in obscurity in the lowliest of conditions and brought that one to the place of greatest honour, I am amazed at my God.

 

You see, it is not about our ability to achieve, but rather it is about His ability to exalt.  God is able to take the person who is completely sold out and dedicated to Him from the prison to the King’s court (Joseph), from tending sheep to the Kingship of the land (David), from the grape press to the place of the general of an army (Gideon) and from lying in the manger to reigning as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

 

In 2 Timothy 1:12 Paul says, “For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day.”

 

That work of infancy in your heart where the fires began to burn on that brand new day and when heaven began to ring like bells over your life was not something that you initiated and it is not something you will have to consummate.  This work of grace is consummated in our hearts through the work of Christ Jesus on the cross.

 

I am convinced that I am safe in God’s arms and no matter what comes in this life I will be with Him where He is.  No matter what the devil tries to do to defeat that work in my life, I will overcome.

 

Jesus was born in a manger to remind us that it does not matter where we come from.  What matters is that if God be for us, who can be against us?  Jesus accomplished the will of the Father and those who are in Christ will accomplish His will also.

 

I pray that through this season you will take some time to remind yourself of what God has done for you, and if you should not yet know Him, then I pray that the greatest revelation of His goodness will rise through this Christmas season. Changed forever by His love, may you then rise to your destiny.