Christmas Day
Pastor Ron Koehler
Grace—Tucson, AZ
December 25, 2024
God’s Glory Required Him to Give Himself as One of Us Exodus 33:18-23; 34:5-7 What? Not what you were expecting for a Christmas Day reading? Hearing about Moses and God calling people to account for sin? Moses lived a millennium and a half before Jesus was born! Moses received God’s condemning Law and gave it to the people! Are we really hearing about God condemning people for generation after generation?! This isn’t Christmas Day kind of stuff! Christmas Day is about the reality of what Jesus did by coming into this world sinking in after being awed by his birth and angels and shepherds last night! So, while at first it might seem like a strange reading for this morning, trust me, it’s not. Moses wanted assurance that the LORD would be with him as he led the people to the Promised Land. The back-and-forth between Moses and the LORD that leads up to our reading is really interesting—you should read it! Moses was asking for things from God—assurances, direction, for God to go with them. Moses got what he asked for: God would be with them. But it might seem that Moses was pushing it a bit when he then asked to see God’s glory. But he said “please,” and God is gracious. There was just one issue: no sinful human being—which is every human being—can see the fullness of God’s glory and live. But God made a way. Moses would see God’s glory, but not all of it. His full glory would be hidden, but the passing flash of God’s glory that he saw was enough. It brought comfort and reassurance that God was with him and his people. If you didn’t notice it at first, maybe it’s making more sense for us to think about these words from Exodus today. Bethlehem hosts the holy, glorious God wrapped in human flesh, but not just wearing human flesh like a coat—truly human in addition to being truly God. His full, divine glory hidden beneath his humanity. The only way for sinful human beings to look at him and live was for it to be like we sang last night: Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; hail th’ incarnate Deity! Pleased as man with man to dwell, Jesus, our Immanuel (Hark the Herald Angels Sing, CW 350 st. 2) Immanuel means “God with us.” Just as Moses begged the LORD to be present with him and his people—and God was—sinful people longed for the promised Savior to come to them. And he did. Like the LORD did with Moses, Jesus passed by in this world…but not quickly. The Glory of God Required Him to Give Himself as One of Us. He had to be born the way he was so that he could live under the expectations of God’s law as we do. He became one of us in order to live the life God demanded that we live—a perfect one. He lived and grew—33 years in this world…living sinlessly…pleasing the Father. Then, the life he offered on the cross was in place of the life we needed to offer but couldn’t. This was necessary. This was required if we were to be saved.