"All the crowns of power flashed upon His brow. All mighty angels called Him Lord."

So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the Inn….                                                                                                                                 

And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the Babe lying in a manger…. And the shepherds went back, glorifying and praising God for all that they had heard and seen, just as had been told them.                                                                                                                                                                                                         Luke 2:6-7, 16, 20

Sleep! Holy Babe!

Upon Thy mother’s breast;

Great Lord of earth and sea and sky,

How sweet it is to see Thee lie

In such a place of rest.

Sleep! Holy Babe!

Thine angels watch around,

All bending low with folded wings,

Before th’ Incarnate King of kings,

In reverent awe profound.

Sleep! Holy Babe!

While I with Mary gaze

In joy upon that face awhile,

Upon the loving infant smile

Which there divinely plays.

Sleep! Holy Babe!

Ah! take Thy brief repose;

Too quickly will Thy slumbers break,

And Thou to lengthened pains awake

That death alone shall close.

EDWARD CASWALL

~ Sleep! Holy Babe

How wonderful this was!  We must remember who it was that was thus born.  The birth of another child in this world was nothing strange, for thousands of children are born every day.  But this was the Lord of glory.  This was not the beginning of His life.  He had lived from all eternity in heaven.  His hands made the universe.  All glory was His.  All the crowns of power flashed upon His brow.  All mighty angels called Him Lord.  We must remember this if we would understand how great was His condescension….  

      Christ’s glory was folded away under robes of human flesh.  He never ceased to be the Son of God; and yet He assumed all the conditions of humanity.  He veiled His power, and became a helpless infant, unable to walk, to speak… lying feeble and dependent in His mother’s bosom… He laid aside His sovereignty, His majesty. What condescension!  And it was all for our sake, that He might lift us up to glory.  It was as a Saviour that He came into this world.  He became Son of man that He might make us sons of God.   He came down to earth and lived among men, entering into their experiences of humiliation, that He might lift them up to glory to share His exaltation.               

J.R. MILLER~

Come Ye Apart

        How gentle the coming!  Who would have had sufficient daring of imagination to conceive that God Almighty would have appeared among men as a little child?  We should have conceived something sensational, phenomenal, catastrophic, appalling!  The most awful of the natural elements would have formed His retinue, and men would be chilled and frozen with fear.  But He came as a little child.  The great God “emptied Himself”; He let in the light as our eyes were able to bear it.

J.H. JOWETT~

My Daily Meditation