Hello, thank you so much for joining me today for Give Him 15.

Several years ago, my dad wrote a wonderful devotional entitled The Gold That Washed Ashore.

It's now out of print. Can't get it.

Dad was old school in his writing and preaching, crafting sermons of homiletic eloquence,

and his devotionals were no exception. This is one of his great devotionals combined with some of

my thoughts. The title of today's post is, he came, taking that title from his devotional.

Luke 2.11, for today in the city of David,

there has been born for you a Savior who is Christ the Lord. Luke 1910, for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.

Some of my thoughts, first.

When Christ came to earth, it was not, as most expected.

The religious world had overlooked the prophecy regarding a virgin, conceiving, Isaiah 714.

Perhaps they simply had a different interpretation of the verse,

since it was considered a total impossibility. At any rate, the birth of Christ through a poor teenage virgin, from the other side of the tracks, Nazareth of all places, wasn't on the list of messianic expectations, nor was a manger,

a feeding trough for a crib in a smelly dung-filled stable, nor was a manger for a crib in a

smelly dung-filled stable. The scribes, Pharisees, and religious elite

were confident. The Messiah would be regal, wealthy, and come from their ranks, of course.

You must admit that Christmas story does strain the imagination.

It is not so difficult to conceive of God coming to earth to rescue fallen humanity,

but becoming a microscopic seed placed in the womb of a teenage girl,

fed by a cord from her placenta, and entering the

world through a narrow birth canal is an entirely different story.

It seems ridiculous and certainly sacrilegious to think of God in dirty diapers, burping, crying for mama.

...