Jesus Is Cloaked in the Common

“When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy. And when they had come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His mother, and fell down and worshipped Him.” (Matthew 21:10-11)

The wise men from the east found Jesus when no one else did. The Jews had been waiting for their Messiah for years, but they missed Christ’s birth.

Even after the wise men tipped off the Jewish leaders about the time and place of the Lord’s birth, Herod still had been unable to find Jesus—and had to ask the wise men to bring word back to him about the location of the baby.

Why were the wise men able to find Jesus when the Jewish leaders weren’t? The wise men weren’t Jews and weren’t waiting for a Messiah. They were astronomers. They were educated men trying to locate a King. Most importantly, they weren’t burdened by false expectations.

The Jewish leaders missed recognizing Jesus because they expected an uncommon Messiah. They assumed His coming would be a supernatural, spectacular, royal event. They were on the lookout for unmistakable evidence.

The wise men, on the other hand, were able and willing to see Jesus for who He was—the child of a common couple in a common village. They found the Messiah despite His everyday appearance, His unassuming parents, and His humble surroundings.

During in the Christmas season, you probably hear talk about “keeping Christ in Christmas.” That’s because it is so easy to lose sight of Him. When it comes to seeking the Lord and recognizing Him, many of us are more like the Jewish leaders than like the wise men.

Because even though Jesus is God, He is very comfortable in the common places, and that is where we will always find Him. Jesus is in our midst today!

God’s desire has always been to live among us and relate to us intimately. We see this in the Garden of Eden story and also in the Incarnation—the birth of Christ into the real world as a real person in a real family.

This meant Jesus had to endure the same pain and rejection we endure on earth. But that was the way God wanted to relate to us. He humbled Himself by taking the nature of a servant and by being made in human likeness (Phil. 2:7).

Jesus lived among us to prove God’s design and desire to save us. As our Savior, He goes where we go. He lives where we live. He is now cloaked in us!

The wise men found Jesus in a stable, with a common family. They worshipped Him though he wasn’t positioned on a special mountaintop or a kingly throne. This Christmas season, we also have the opportunity to worship Him.

Our prayer for you over the next several days is that you will discover Christ on the mountaintops and the valleys, in your tears and laughter, in your normal and common life.

Look for Him in the normal things of the season: as you shop, as you dine with friends, as you clean the house or rake leaves, as you pay bills and wrap gifts. He is Emmanuel, “God with us,” cloaked in the common.

And still He is God, worthy of our highest praise and reverence!