What kind of garments are swaddling clothes? This was the
attire of the baby laid in the manger.
Most babies are wrapped in softness and laid in a bed designed for them
but this baby was wrapped in bands of cloth and laid in a place designed for the
feeding of animals. If this child is destined to be the Messiah, why does he
lay like the poorest of children in a place of strange and awkward
circumstance?
What kind of animal is a young donkey? This was the animal
that bore this king coming into Jerusalem.
Most kings rode on mighty stallions and demanded homage but this king
was coming in humility nodding along a street strewn with branches broken off from
the trees. If this Messiah was truly a
king, how can he claim his place of royalty with such a lack of substance and
authority?
What kind of the division of possessions requires the
casting lots to acquire? These garments
of cloth were the only earthly possessions of this rabbi which were of any
value. Most great men had gold, silver,
scrolls and other treasures but this man had only his garments. If these used
pieces of cloth were the Messiah’s only possessions, why were the ones who
loved him, not among the bidders as the spoils seemed destined only for a lucky
enemy?
Three separate events from a time long ago of which none of them,
seem the least bit logical to most of us.
We would not wrap our child in swaddling clothes to lay them in a
manger. We would not put our king on the
back of a donkey and we would be present to try for the possessions of any one
we loved. Yet all of this was prepared
in the perfect and planned providence of the Almighty God in the sending of His
son into the world to dwell with us and bring us salvation. After all these
years, we struggle to understand the purpose of any of it.
When our Savior, the creator of all things; humbled himself
to become a man, his Father left no doubt as to how he would live out his days on
this earth. This Messiah with the name of Jesus, who would become the Christ,
would experience every facet of life on the earth; starting from the most humble of beginnings to the fleeting praise of the masses and eventually the abandonment
of the devotion of most of his followers. He would also know every temptation common to us as humans. These were the experiences of Jesus during
his time on earth, ending in the culmination of his brutal death on a wooden
cross usually reserved for the worst of criminals.
His redeeming death for the sin of the world required a separation from
his Father’s love. This was a separation of the Father and the Son which was unknown
in all of time, since the loving union existed without a beginning, from before
everlasting.
Following the death of the Son, the Father’s love moved across
time and space, raising up the Son from the grave through the power of His
Spirit. God thus gives new life now and forever to all who believe in His Son.
The Son is now lifted high up above all names as He is now and forever more, Jesus
Christ the Lord, the Everlasting Messiah and Eternal King of Kings. Quite a transformation from the baby wrapped
in swaddling clothes, a Messiah who rode on the back of a young donkey and the
man who watched his enemies cast lots over his only possessions even as He died
on a cross.
If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead
dwells in you, He who raised Jesus from the dead will also give life to your
mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you (Rms. 8:11 NKJ).
Suggested Reading ... John 12
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