A King's Contemplation.

Have you ever felt as if you weren’t good enough? As if you’d stepped into a place where you had no right to be. Like going to a meal dressed for pizza, when everyone else was dressed for caviar and lobster.  It was like that the night I met Jesus.

 I’m important where I come from. People rate me. They call me a wise man.

 I realised that night, I was foolish and ignorant.

I’d gone to Bethlehem because I’d been gazing up at the heavens and seen something I thought was worth a long journey. Meanwhile, God had been gazing down at me and seen something he thought was worth a long journey. Compared to what God’s son did, my long journey and the kneeling humbly on a cold stone floor with  my regal robes dragging in the dust, paled into insignificance.

 Jesus was God’s equal. He’d been there when the worlds were first created, He was King of the universe,  but here he was  in a tiny little house in the middle of nowhere being looked after by a couple of people who were just good people, not famous, not rich, not important...just good.

Later, when he was older, people dressed him in some royal robes and gave him a crown to wear.

The crown was made of thorns. Then they spat on his royal robes, and slapped his royal face and ridiculed him. After that they stripped his robes off him and crucified him.  Naked on a cross for everyone to laugh at. And do you know what he said, while he hung there? “Father forgive them.”

 Until that point God had been unable to do it, but as His son died there bearing our sins, it became a possibility. And that’s why I’m a wise man. Not because I found the star, but because I found the Saviour; and realised he’d come to find me; and to save me from an eternity separated from all that’s good and true and loving .

 You can become a wise man this Christmas.