"On that very first Christmas, earth was oblivious to all that was happening. But heaven wasn't. The holy angels were waiting in anticipation to break forth in praise and worship and adoration at the birth of the new born Child. This Child's birth meant deliverance for mankind. The angel told Joseph: "He will save His people from their sins" (Matthew 1:21). Jesus knew that to do that, He would have to die.
The important issue of Christmas is not so much that Jesus came, but why He came. There was no salvation in His birth. Nor did the sinless way He lived His life have any redemptive force of its own. His example, flawless as it was, could not rescue us from our sins. Even His teaching, the greatest truth ever revealed, could not save us. There was a price to be paid for our sins. Someone had to die. Only Jesus could do it.
Jesus came to earth to reveal God to mankind. He came to teach truth. He came to fulfill the Law. He came to offer His kingdom. He came to show us how to live. He came to reveal God's love. He came to bring peace. He came to heal the sick. He came to minister to the needy.
But all those reasons are incidental to His ultimate purpose. He could have done them all without being born as a human. He could have simply appeared - like the angel of the Lord often did in the Old Testament - and accomplished everything in the above list, without literally becoming a man. But He had one more reason for coming: He came to die.
Here's a side to the Christmas story that isn't often told. Those soft little hands, fashioned by the Holy Spirit in Mary's womb, were made so that the nails might be driven through them. Those baby feet, pink and unable to walk, would one day walk up a dusty hill to be nailed to a cross. That sweet infant's head with the sparkling eyes and eager mouth was formed so that someday men might force a crown of thorns onto it. That tender body, warm and soft, wrapped in swaddling cloths, would one day be ripped open by a spear."
~taken from God's Gift of Christmas by John MacArthur
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