Incarnation

I think the more educated a person gets the more they realize just how much they don’t know.  There was a time in Bible College when I thought “you know what, I’m pretty smart, I think I have my mind around all this theological stuff”.  Later when working on my Masters of Divinity at Northwest Nazarene University I opened up my mind and saw that everything was not nearly as neat or black and white as I once thought.  I began to realize there were some things I just didn’t have an answer for.  Now that I am working on my doctorate degree I know that I don’t know crap!  Besides being a small fortune in debt and the realization that I don’t know much my education has given me TSE (theologically sensitive ears).  Much like the musician with perfect pitch is annoyed by notes played even slightly off key; TSE causes me to be annoyed by theological inconsistencies.  This reared its ugly head this week while I was listening to some Christmas music.  I was listening to “Away in a Manger” and heard these words:

The cattle are lowing

The poor Baby wakes

But little Lord Jesus

No crying He makes

After I realized that “lowing” is not the opposite of heightening, but a sound cows make I thought about why Jesus didn’t cry when he seemed to be startled awake by the cows lowing.  I asked some friends about this and the most popular answer was that Jesus wasn’t startled awake, he was simply enjoying a peaceful moment in the manger with the cows gently mooing in the background.  I pondered all this and concluded the popular answer was wrong.  You see lowing is not a gentle sound, as matter of fact a synonym for lowing is roaring.  And why would they call the baby “poor” if it had not been startled awake?  You don’t say look at the poor baby enjoying a peaceful moment.  You say “oh poor baby did those nasty cows wake you up!”  I then concluded the author of the song was making a theological point that the baby Jesus did not cry because that somehow equated to sin.  I further concluded that when people think of the baby Jesus not crying they disconnect from the fact that the baby Jesus was 100% human.  And if we forget that Jesus was 100% human we miss out on how much God loves us through the role Jesus played in the Christmas story.  Who else but a God who loves unconditionally would empty himself of all divine power (Philippians 2:7) and become like us to show us love!