God Incarnate: Total vulnerability and perfect peace

Imagine placing your greatest treasure—a treasure on which the fate of the world rests—into the hands of someone who had never had a job, never lived sober more than six months, or worse, imagine placing it into the hands of somebody who hated you. 

Genevieve, what are you talking about? I’m talking about the total vulnerability and perfect plan of our God who sent His one and only Son—His treasure—into this sin-encumbered world.

Enjoy this Christmas reflection from UGM Content and Communications Manager
Genevieve Gromlich.

Mary loved God. There is no doubt. Scripture says she was chosen by God to conceive and bear the child Messiah due to her faith. And I am certain that she did her earthly best to protect and care for Him from the time she felt His life within her to when He became a man—or, perhaps, beyond. But what mother can ever perfectly protect her infant? None. God did not give Jesus to Mary because He knew that His Son would be safe with her; He gave Him to her knowing full well that, in earthly terms, it was not safe.

Perhaps it’s my anxiety speaking, but I think it is incredibly obvious that life on earth is not safe. Accidents, disease, cruelty, and pure evil can feel to a young parent like monsters lurking in shadows. And as our children grow, we become even more aware of how little control we have over the course of their lives.

Yet, God gave His Treasure to a young, human woman. 

In the midst of our chaotic world, Jesus was:

Completely vulnerable to accidents, sin, temptation, and disease. Setting aside His divinity; taking on a living, breathing human body; and walking 33 years in a sin-encumbered world, means He faced the same risks that we do. We don’t have stories of him getting a sore throat or stubbing his toe, but I imagine He did. Scripture does show us a man who grew weary, took naps, got fed up with the Pharisees, and wept with the weight of grief. He was a human in a fallen world.

Perfectly safe in His Father’s plan. God the Father had planned this life, this world-shaking, all-encompassing event since before the foundation of time itself. And nothing—not storms, nor catastrophes, nor sin, nor even the schemes of the devil—can alter even one degree of any plan our God sets in motion. Nothing. The plan for Jesus’ life was never at risk.

Wait, but was He safe? We know He wasn't. We know the way He died: God’s Treasure was murdered. He was delivered, innocent, into the hands of those who hated Him. Publicly tortured and hung on a filthy cross. The Treasure of God became grotesque.

This is hard! The story of Christmas is hard because the story of Easter shakes us. Like I said in the beginning, imagine placing your greatest treasure into the hands of somebody you knew would destroy it. If this was the plan for my child, I would die of fear or heartbreak. 

“Imagine placing your greatest treasure

into the hands of somebody you knew

would destroy it.”

Here is the weight of the love of God for you and me: Instead of damning the world and walking away disgusted at the evil in all of our hearts, He entered it. Perfection incarnate walked our planet and shed His sinless blood to bear the consequences of our sin and to insist that a relationship with us is worth everything to Him. Everything, even His Treasure.

Of course, death could not hold Him down. He rose on the third day, His human body perfected. He conquered death for all who accept His sacrifice on our behalf, for all who treasure an unearned relationship with the Father. Mind blowing. 

This may feel like a heavy dose of theology for the week before Christmas when stockings need to be hung and shopping lines are long, but isn’t it good to remember that Jesus was once a helpless infant in the womb of a teenage girl, and still God’s perfect plan came to pass? His greatest plan is already accomplished and He did it right here on Earth with people like you and me and the guy on the corner, and all of His everyday plans for you and me are not at risk, either. Because of this, we can rest and we can offer rest. 

“His greatest plan is already accomplished and He

did it right here on Earth with people like you and

me and the guy on the corner...”

This Christmas, I hope you marvel at the gift of the infant Messiah. Because of Him, we can be totally vulnerable as frail people on planet Earth and perfectly at peace as sons and daughters of the living God. In every detail of our daily lives, may we allow the peace of Christ to saturate our hearts and spill out abundantly into every life we touch.