December 21, the birth of the ancient of days.

Then Pilate said to him,

So you are a king.

Jesus answered,

You say that I am a king.

For this purpose I was born,

and for this purpose I have come into the world to bear witness to the truth.

Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice, John 1837.

This is a great Christmas text, even though it comes from the very end of Jesus' life on earth, not the beginning.

Notice, Jesus says not only that he was born, but that he came into the world.

The uniqueness of his birth is that he did not originate at his birth.

He existed before he was born in a manger. The personhood, the character, the personality

of Jesus of Nazareth existed before the man Jesus of Nazareth was born.

The theological word to describe this mystery is not creation but incarnation.

The person, not the body, but the essential personhood of Jesus existed before he was born as man. His birth was not a

coming into being of a new person, but a coming into the world of an infinitely old

person. Micah 5 too puts it like this, 700 years before Jesus was born.

But you, O Bethlehem, Ephritha, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,

from you shall come forth for me, one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.

The mystery of the birth of Jesus is not merely that he was born of a virgin.

That miracle was intended by God to witness to an even greater

one, namely that the child born at Christmas was a person who existed from of old, from ancient

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