IN the manger of Bethlehem a Child is given, a Child of man is born unto us. To what purpose? Why did Immanuel not appear at once in matured form? Why was it, that the Son of God had to annihilate Himself to the neediness, to the powerlessness of the babe at mother’s breast, yea, to the hiddenness of the yet unborn babe? The Church of Christ answers this question with the unanimous confession, that in this the judgment was passed upon your conception and your birth. All the way back of your birth, yea, even to your conception the root fiber of sinful corruption twines itself around your human life, and therefore into that most deeply hidden beginning of your human existence, He, Who was to be your Savior, had to enter.
The question: “What profit dost thou receive by Christ’s holy conception and nativity?” the Heidelberger answers with this entirely correct, far too little considered, and yet so comforting reply: “That with His innocence He covers in God’s sight your sins, wherein you were conceived and brought forth.”
So the mystery of Bethlehem is only for “the people that sit in darkness”, that feel the deep shadow of original sin from their birth and conception come upon them, as a dark night; and that under this shadow they are most deeply troubled, and sigh, that evil dwells in their nature itself, and that from their first beginning, yea, from their very conception, their is no finger-breadth and no line, in which sin was not there before them, to involve in sin before God their existence itself as man.
And to him who has a perception of this, and feels oppressed by reason of this ominous darkness, at Bethlehem a Light hath appeared in the darkness. For that “Child born unto us” speaks of a salvation which traces the poison back to our infancy. That Child conceived of the Holy Ghost, extends the salvation of our God back of our conception.
And this Child is named with five names, every one of them rich of content. To the people that know the darkness, a “great Light” appears, and He, in Whom that light appears, is called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the everlasting Father, and Prince of peace.
To have you understand the meaning of that Wonderful, the prophet points you to Israel’s history in the days of Gideon. Not for the sake of Gideon, but because in Israel’s struggle and distress and deliverance there lies outlined figuratively the struggle and the suffering and the redemption of all the Lord’s people.
Israel too at the time was under the cloud of darkness. Midian had invaded the land, had massacred the people, committed violence and engaged in pillage, and there was no one able to bring deliverance out of the hand of Midian.
For only by turning sword against sword, spear against spear, and arrow against arrow, did deliverance out of Midian’s hand seem possible. And lo, when every troubled soul in Israel expected deliverance from the crossing of the sword, all unexpectedly God wrought deliverance by means of pitchers that were broken and by torches that were swayed to and fro by the men under Gideon.
That was Wonderful. When it is expected from the sword, dripping with blood, and it comes from a pitcher that you break.
Then it goes against all form of thought, and it comes to pass by that whereof no one had a surmise. And so likewise this “Child that is born unto us” is first of all called Wonderful because the salvation did not come in the way wherein every one who had longed for redemption had hoped it would come, but from a side toward which no eye had turned. You had expected it from the wise men of the world, from the thinkers of the age, from the nobles among the people, and now, look at that Babe. That is your Immanuel. That Babe in swaddling-clothes, in Him is all your salvation.
Wonderful is when nature must give up; when the course of things seems impotent; when from our human existence, from our human race, and from all the treasures that hide in our humanity, no help can come; and when outside of natural and human power, help comes to you from God.
From His wondrous grace, through His almightiness!
The same is unfolded closer still in that second name: Counsellor.
There is counsel, when in common need, they who together are bowed down under oppression or anxiety, take counsel, plan counsel, provide counsel.
Again, there is counsel in need, when at the critical moment some wise man lifts up his voice and gives counsel to those who are desperate.
And so in this common need of sin counsel had been sought and counsel had been the theme of keen deliberation. By each one for himself and by many together. And time and again among all sorts of people and under all sorts of skies a wise man had arisen, to give counsel to the people, and to press his counsel upon them.