December 23, 2009 – The Child, The Child
Scripture: Isaiah 9:6 (KJV)
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
Devotion:
In Genesis, God tells Abraham that He will bless Sarah and she will bear Abraham a son. Not only that but God will bless her so that she will be the mother of many nations.
And how does Abraham respond? He fell on his face, laughing. He couldn’t believe that he and Sarah, as old as they were, could have their own child. I’m not certain how the people at the time of that first Christmas understood the verse from Isaiah quoted above, but I’m fairly certain that if you told that that the Messiah was coming as a child, they would follow the example of Abraham – they would be rolling on the floor laughing.
Here is God doing the unexpected again. Instead of the warrior king coming in on horseback to show the Romans a thing or three, God shows up as a wailing child (well, he did have an angel chorus as a warm-up act but we have to accept the word of those smelly shepherds). Instead of giving a “quick fix”, God offers a permanent solution.
The words from Isaiah echo forth this season – we hear them in the performance of Handel’s Messiah and they echo from many a pulpit as a reminder of the ancient promise fulfilled. They remind us of how God’s ways are not like ours. They remind us that the Child is born to us, He is given to us, and the government, the control of everything in the universe, is His.
Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace, born to us and given to us as a Child, as a Son. Take control. We tend to make a mess of things and we need You to establish Your government in our lives. Do the unexpected. You reign forever and ever and ever. Amen.
