‘And she brought forth her newborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger’ – Luke 2:7
How extraordinary is the chronicle of Christ’s Nativity! Peasant parents-to-be on the move to register for the all-powerful Emperor Augustus’s census, mere mice in a world patrolled by imperial lions. Arriving at their destination, they are forced to bring forth their miracle child in less-than-ideal conditions. Depending on your interpretation of events, they were either shuffled off from the inn to a barn out back or relegated to the lower portion of a dwelling where the animals were kept. Either way, their son – no less than the Son of the God – was born in a stable. You might have thought that the Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth, who created the universe out of nothing, could have arranged a better location for His Son’s birth than a place that stank like wet animal fur and dung. The only people who came to acknowledge the incredible introduction of God in human skin were shepherds (the magi came later), hardly the major players of Judean society. It was hardly an auspicious beginning. The regents of the world would never have done it this way.
Which is precisely the point. This was the unfolding of God’s plan to save the world, and God, though the possessor of ultimate and comprehensive power, doesn’t behave like the world’s major players. He reveals his strength in weakness, a weakness that proves itself to be stronger than human strength (See, 1 Corinthians 1:25; 2 Corinthians 12:9). It is through weakness and foolishness that God saves the world. Which explains perfectly why Jesus was conceived in the womb of a poor peasant girl, birthed in a stable, and laid in a manger, why he came into the world not as a major player but, if you will, a ‘manger player.’ That’s the way God rolls.
We would do well to remember this.
Too often we do not. History is replete with examples of professing Jesus followers pursuing the way of power, the path of the major players, rather than the path of the one in the manger. It is a path God never asked his people to follow, one that He Himself expressly rejected in the life of His Son. Yet many follow it anyway, believing that obtaining what the world perceives as power is not only important but a matter of life and death.
I am reminded of this every day when I read the news. The 2020 Presidential election is over, and most of us would like to move on, but as we all know the President is playing a dangerous game, spinning patently false conspiracy theories in a transparent attempt to steal an election in pursuit of his own interests. That a political leader, a major player on the world stage, would behave in such a manner probably shouldn’t surprise us. The regents of the world often behave this way. It’s kind of par for the course. The extent to which it seems odd to us in America reflects how privileged we have been in this society up to this point. Not everyone in the world is quite so privileged.
But to see professing Christians, those who claim to follow Jesus, backing such an effort, hoping to thereby have access to the halls of power, exercise influence, and advance an agenda, should shock the conscience of everyone who hopes to honestly follow the one born and laid in a manger.
An influential leader in the evangelical world recently gave voice to the position of many when he echoed the President’s lies, refused to accept the ‘monstrous’ Joe Biden as his fellow American, and called the election ‘the most horrifying thing that has ever happened in the history of the nation.’ He then proclaimed to the President (who had called in to his show; yes, this man has a show): ‘I’d be willing to die in this fight. This is a fight for everything. God is with us.’[1] In brief, this leader conveyed his belief that Christians had to fight for Trump because everything depends on keeping him in office.
I beg to differ. Christians should know that everything does not depend on keeping one’s preferred political candidate in power. Rather, everything depends on following the one who, rather than be born in a palace and laid on a bed of downy softness, was born in a stable and laid in a manger. Everything depends on following the one who, after he grew into adulthood, expressly spurned the imperial power game. Everything depends on following the one who, though he had created all things, rejected being a major player on the world’s terms, took up his cross as his preferred means to save the world, and called us to do the same.
The Apostle Paul said that Christians are to have the same mind as Christ Jesus, who, even though he was God, renounced his privilege, became one of us, took on the form of a servant, and humbled himself all the way to the Cross (Philippians 2:5-8).
There is a battle worth dying for in our time. It’s a battle for the soul of the Church. In this battle, with all due respect to the evangelical leader quoted above (and those who agree with him), the question is not whether we will give our lives for Donald Trump. Or Joe Biden. Or any other major player on the scene of imperial politics. The question is not whether we will give our lives in the mad quest to obtain imperial power that we might change the world from the top down. The question is whether we will give our lives, not for the major players, but for the ‘manger player,’ pursue his humble path, and walk with him as he changes the world from the bottom up.
As the Mandalorian would say, ‘This is the way,’ and everything depends upon our following it.
Under Christ’s Mercy,
Brent
[1] Eric Metaxas, Christian Radio Host, Tells Trump, ‘Jesus is With Us in this Fight.’ Religion New Service. November 30, 2020.