Even so, Come Lord Jesus

"an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: "Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel," which means, "God is with us."

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. God finally lost his temper and 'came down here' to give us all a good..

No, wait, that's not what happened at all. The Lord did not come down riding on the clouds, barreling down the hill on a white horse to kick the Romans out of Palestine, drive the dirty gentiles out of Jerusalem and kick Herod in the 'guts' for collecting taxes for the dirty Romans. He absolutely did not do that. His people were disappointed. I'm sure there's even a few angels out there kicking the dirt and wishing they could have stomped some bad guy face into it over this one, so I'm not going to say I blame them.

Let's face it, I like the idea of riding in a white horse and getting rid of all the bad guys in the world. It appeals to me. It appeals to me like Nazis with their faces melting off at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. But the Lord didn't do that. Instead of coming as he deserved, he was born to a working class couple who couldn't even negotiate a hotel room.

Because he was God with us. All of us. Not just the important people. He didn't set the world on its head the way everyone thought he would. He did it his way. One heart at a time.

Gently. Gently, he changed the world and is changing it still.