This Christmas is different for me. I am discovering Jesus in ways I never have before. Several weeks ago I decided to read through the book of Matthew straight through in only a few sittings. I did this so that I could get an objective view of the life of Jesus (because nearly every time I've heard about Jesus it has been about a specific part of his life (i.e., his death, his resurrection, his miracles)-- so I wanted to read through it pretty quickly so I could get a birds eye view of his life.
Well to be quite honest I did not read through the entire book. But I read enough to find something very interesting . What I found were dozens and dozens of these unconventional -alities. (Can't think of another word for it? sorry.) What I mean is this-- It starts out with the genealogy of Jesus and among them is David (who slept with his General's wife, impregnated her, tried to cover it up, had the General killed in battle to cover up his mistake, and then the child died.) Reading that just struck me. The Savior of the World has in his lineage someone who has messed up, made mistakes, and done many wrong things.
- Next, he was born to a virgin-- This is only something supernatural from God. Virginity and birthing a baby is, well...something that is never paired together. But it is a crazy God-created facet of this story.
- Then ANGELS came to shepherds and told them exactly where to look for this baby who is the Savior. I don't know anyone who has ever seen an angel, and I think when one of God's angels shows up to announce news, it is world-changing news.
- Next, Mary and Joseph escaped to Egypt with their new Savior baby because the King wanted to kill Him.--I think the equivalent of that would be if I had a newborn and Russell and I escaped to Mexico or Canada in fear that someone wanted to kill our baby. So crazy. But they trusted in God the whole time and He kept them safe.
- Later God sent an ANGEL (again, how many times have an of us seen an angel?) and the angel told Joseph it was safe to go back. So he and Mary ended up in Nazareth and this crazily enough fulfilled prophecy that was written HUNDREDS of years ago about Jesus.
- When Jesus begins his ministry, he turns everything upside down. Starting with the Beatitudes he begins to take all of the laws and practices that the people have been practicing for hundreds of years and begins to teach in this new way. According to Jesus, you are blessed if: you are poor, you are meek, you hunger and thirst, and if you are persecuted because of righteousness (among many other things). Poverty, meekness, hunger, and persecution are not things these people associated with being blessed, but Jesus changes all of this.
- Then for the next 6 topics, Jesus beings with something like "You have heard it was said"--then he tells them quite the opposite. Here is an example: "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you... This just amazed me because 'Love your neighbor, hate your enemy' was tradition that these people had been following for years, but Jesus comes in and turns this idea upside down. He is telling them to do unconventional things in unconventional ways. The chapters where makes all these historical changes is in Matthew 5-7.
