Tomorrow is Christmas. It is Jesus’ birthday. That’s the day He came into the world. We celebrate it only because He came. That’s the reason you celebrate your birthday, isn’t it? Because it marks the beginning of your life in this world — because that’s the day you came.

But why all the hubbub and hurrah over Jesus’ birthday? Why does everybody celebrate His birthday? Everybody doesn’t celebrate your birthday or mine. It must be because His coming into the world was of more importance than your coming and mine. And just what did Jesus come for that was so important that everyone should get so excited over celebrating His birthday?

Well, for one thing, Jesus came to bring joy. That’s why He was born. The gospel story says His mother Mary rejoiced when she had given birth to a son. And the angel said to the shepherds keeping watch over their flock by night: “Fear not, for behold, I bring you tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day a Savior, which is Christ the Lord … And when the wise men saw the star shining over the place where the young child lay, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy.” Every detail of the gospel birth story is shot through with the note of joy.

And when Jesus, grown to manhood, speaking to His disciples of His purpose in coming, said: “These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.” I believe it was Henry Drummond, was it not, who bids us examine our gospels with an eye to seeing how great a part of the Master’s whole life was spent in just bringing joy to human hearts: to the widow of Nain, to Mary and Martha at Lazarus’ tomb, to blind Bartimaeus, to the Magdalene’s cleansed heart — and all the others. Yes, Jesus came to bring joy into a sad world, so at Christmastime we sing:

“Joy to the world, the Lord is come.

Let earth receive her King.”

But Jesus came also to give new worth to man — not just to make him happy, but to lift him to a new level of being. When Dr. John Goss, President of Simpson College, asked George Washington Carver, one of Simpson’s most illustrious alumni, what Simpson College had done for him, the great scientist who had been born the son of a slave replied: “Simpson College made me realize that I am a human being.”

Well, Christ came to make men realize that they were human beings, beings with an immortal soul and a divine destiny, whether they were bond or free, male or female, white or black. Christ came to bring life and immortality to light for man — to bid him lift up his eyes and behold the glory of eternal destiny to which a merciful providence calls every man.

Dr. G. Campbell Morgan says that “the supreme splendor of Jesus’ birth was the lowliness of it, the humiliation of it. By that lowliness and humiliation God did reveal to all ages the essential dignity of human nature. This, of course, is revolutionary. Two millenniums have come and gone and the world does not yet believe it. But here it is, God’s lesson for the ages. When God stooped, when He brought the first begotten into the world, when He laid hold upon our human flesh, when Jesus was made flesh and came among us — God proved that surroundings neither ennoble nor degrade humanity. A court and a crown would not have ennobled that babe; the stable and the manger did not degrade Him. Behold, the babe lying in the manger as though to emphasize the weakness and the humility and the simplicity of it — wrapped in swaddling clothes. Humanity needs no court, no crown, no garments to make it full of dignity.” It needs only the touch of the divine, which Christ came to bring. Jesus came to give a new worth to man.

But Jesus came also to give love a new impetus. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son” — there it is in the very counsels of the eternal — a purpose of God in Jesus’ coming — to give new impetus to love. So Jesus came to earth to be the love of God for men incarnate in human flesh; and gently He taught us to love one another. Beloved, this is the new commandment — that we had from Him from the beginning of His coming to us — that we should love one another.

Last week we read a story about the evacuation of a thousand street waifs from Seoul, Korea. Yes, in the same papers that carried the deplorable casualty lists of American boys lost in the Korean fighting, there was also this appealing story of the rescue of those pitiful little war orphans who were flown by American war planes to an island sanctuary. How were they saved? Why those starving, cast-off children had been picked up by retreating G.I.’s — our boys, for whose life safety we’ve all been praying, but who themselves were not so busy saving their own skins that they could forget others, but took the precious, perilous time in their hasty retreat to stop and stoop, and save from the gutters and sewers of doomed cities some of God’s little ones. And American nurses flew those emaciated, sick little lost sheep of the Lord Jesus to safety. Why? O, because Jesus came and gave to human hearts a new impetus to love — to love like God loves, without any prudential judgments about the worth or the deserving of the object loved — just loving without limit or reason. Because — once in the long ago, while Herod’s soldiers butchered the innocents in the streets of Bethlehem, God was nurturing a babe, who by his life and death, was to fire men’s hearts with a new and divine love which was destined to transform the world. Yes, Jesus came to give a new impetus to love. And what a boost it was! And the end is not yet!

But finally, Jesus came to give men and women and little children a chance to give gifts to God. Did you ever think about that — as a reason for Christ’s coming? So long as God remained in His heaven — so long as God continued a “Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable — that hath not a body like man,” we couldn’t bring gifts to Him. We didn’t know how to get to Him. But when Jesus was born a baby in Bethlehem, the wise men, the shepherds, and all others who wanted to, could bring their gifts to Him.

Sigrid Undset remarks upon the wonder that He whose are the heavens and the earth — who “has laid the foundations of this ball of earth and all that is upon it, is now coming to us as the lowest of us all to serve us … that — He has chosen to come to us so weak and naked in order that we, each one, may do something for Him. Is not this the last and most mysterious reason for the joy of Christmas — that the world has been turned upside down — that the Almighty has laid aside the insignia of office and receives our gifts if we want to give them to Him?”

Yes, Jesus came, and this is the supreme reason for His coming, that we might come to Him bringing our gifts and through Him come to God.

And what gifts can we bring for Christ at Christmas? These young people, who this morning gave their hearts and lives to Christ, are keeping Christmas as it ought to be kept. They have chosen this day whom they will serve. They have brought their hearts’ devotion and laid this gift supreme upon the high altar for the Savior’s service.

So they are setting for us the right example. “And a little child shall lead them” — especially at Christmas. Ours is the constant need of renewal — of shaking off the old man — the man grown senile with the world’s knowledge, encrusted with incredulity, wise in our own conceit, impervious to the power of love and patience. Yes, ours is the need of becoming again in spirit as little children — trusting and believing and eager to learn new wonders from our Lord, who comes again to us as the Babe of Bethlehem.

• Scripture Reference: Luke 2:1-22 • Secondary Scripture References: n/a • Subject : Purpose of Christ’s coming; The • Special Topic: n/a • Series: n/a • Occasion: n/a • First Preached: 12/24/1950 • Last Preached: 12/24/1950 • Rating: 3 • Book/Author References: , Dr. G. Campbell Morgan