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The Babe of Bethlehem, January 20
Unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is
Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the
babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
Luke 2:11, 12
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We cannot understand how Christ became a little, helpless babe. He
could have come to earth in such beauty that He would have been unlike
the sons of men. His face could have been bright with light, and His form
could have been tall and beautiful. He could have come in such a way as
to charm those who looked upon Him, but this was not the way that God
planned He should come among the sons of men. He was to be like those
who belonged to the human family and to the Jewish race. His features
were to be like those of other human beings and He was not to have such
beauty of person as to make people point Him out as different from others.
He was to come as one of the human family, and to stand as a man before
heaven and earth. He had come to take man’s place, to pledge Himself in
man’s behalf, to pay the debt that sinners owed. He was to live a pure life
on the earth, and show that Satan had told a falsehood when he claimed
that the human family belonged to him forever, and that God could not take
men out of his hands.
Men first beheld Christ as a babe, as a child. His parents were very
poor, and He had nothing in this earth save that which the poor have. He
passed through all the trials that the poor and lowly pass through from
babyhood to childhood, from youth to manhood....
The more we think about Christ’s becoming a babe here on earth,
the more wonderful it appears. How can it be that the helpless babe in
Bethlehem’s manger is still the divine Son of God? Though we cannot
understand it, we can believe that He who made the worlds, for our sakes
became a helpless babe. Though higher than any of the angels, though as
great as the Father on the throne of heaven, He became one with us. In
Him God and man became one, and it is in this fact that we find the hope
of our fallen race. Looking upon Christ in the flesh, we look upon God in
humanity and see in Him the brightness of divine glory, the express image
of God the Father
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The Youth’s Instructor, November 21, 1895
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