I hope your celebration of Christmas yesterday was full of joy with friends and family. This week I’ve been focusing on all the blessings we have because of that first Christmas.

I want to quote today from the Advent book, Joy to the World, by John Piper. He writes:

My favorite Christmas text centers on humility. . .

Though he was in the form of God, [Jesus] did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:6-8).

Jesus’ humility was a conscious act of putting himself in a lowly, servant role for the good of others. His humility did not arise from being finite or fallible or sinful…Jesus’ humility did not arise from any sense of defect in himself, but from a sense of fullness in himself put at the disposal of others for their good. It was a voluntary lowering of himself to make the height of his glory available for sinners to enjoy.[1]

Did you ever think about the fact that Jesus humbled himself? But he wasn’t humble for the same reasons we are—or should be. He was willing to take on human flesh, leave his glory in Heaven with the Father, and endure the humiliation of death on a cross. “The way that Jesus accomplished our gracious salvation was through voluntary, conscious self-lowering in servant-like obedience to the point of death (Piper, 2018).” All for you and me!

I close this Christmas week with a verse from the carol “Once in David’s Royal City:”

And our eyes at last shall see him, through his own redeeming love;

For that child so dear and gentle, is our Lord in heaven above,

And he leads his children on, to the place where he is gone.

—

[1] Piper, J. (2018). Joy to the World.