“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given:”

It has been said that, if the three wise men at the Nativity had been three wise women, they would have asked directions, arrived on time, cleaned the stable, helped deliver the baby, and given practical gifts. 

Of course, had it been one of us men, we would have probably booked a room in the King David Hotel, hired a doctor to be at the bedside, and ordered something off Amazon.com.

I reckon so.  But the Lord didn’t do it that way, did He? 

Why did God decide to bring forth His Savior through common childbirth?  Why couldn’t He have just stood up in the sky and expose His Glory for all to see, and just tell us what to do?  That would have dissolved all doubts.  That’s how we would have done it, wouldn’t we?

When the Lord does something, He often moves in ways that the carnal mind would never have chosen.  We purchase programs with sets of instructions, plan out campaigns, take surveys, place ads, and pursue anything else that we think will bring about the desired responses.  Too often we end up with something that may look good, but which does not carry the same eternal weight that it would have had if we had allowed God to do it.

God, on the other hand, chooses foolish things to confound the wise.  He calls His prophets out of nowhere, raises up preachers with unpopular messages, and relies on the prayers of people simple enough to believe Him.  To bring about His purposes, He uses yielded vessels to carry out His work, not sophisticated intelligent men. 

But if it’s going to work, it has to be God who does it.

Funny how He works in ways we would never have figured, but you know what?  He always gets incredible results. 

He chose the most humble of births, and died the most desecrating of deaths so that we would have the opportunity to choose Him. 

Unto us a child is born.  But who would have ever thought that He would have chosen a stable for his birth?  But the world has never forgotten it.

And 2,000 years later, wise men still seek Him.