Jesus’ Advent was costly. Jesus came to die in our place for our sin. Jesus’ Advent was also costly for some families and little boys.
The day you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you will die. Those words are a gracious warning of the consequences of not hearing and obeying God.
The result of the sin of rebellion against God has cost the lives of untold numbers of people at the hands of other people who have been ravaged by the fall of mankind into sin.
The wage of sin is death.
Jesus coming to put an end to the reign of death would be costly. It would cost the death of the Son of God, and that death would be preceded by the death of innocent little boys.
Matthew 2:16-18 records Herod’s slaughter of innocent little boys to try and stamp out the King born in Bethlehem. This death of the innocent children prepares us for the death of Jesus, the innocent Son of God who would in his death set all things in motion to make right the injustice done to other innocent people, including these little boys who would die because of sin and become a preparation for us to see Jesus more clearly.
The day of remembrance of this event is December 28, but since we typically stop thinking about Christmas after December 25, I wanted to post it today.
Matthew’s account always moves my soul because I have a pretty robust imagination.
I’d like to share my favorite poem that has put some language to my imagination of what this awful event might have been like, and what it might have been like if Jesus addressed it with one of the dads of a slaughtered boy, paying that awful price on one of Herod’s raids.
This is just a “what if” put into poetry that helps us see Jesus’ a little more clearly this Advent season.
I hope you will enjoy “The Innkeeper”.
Advent. He has come, and he will set all things right.
Theology in the Dirt 