December 23 Advent thoughts

‘…Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, for what is conceived in her is of the Hoy Spirit.’ Matthew 1:20

The scriptures make it very plain that the Christ will be descendant of David, son of Jesse and that He will sit on David’s throne. King David. War chief, liar, adulterer, thief. And a man after God’s own heart, as was written by the prophet Samuel and reiterated by Paul. What a powerful testimony and hope for all of us. For at every turn David repented and constantly was seeking God. Why would not the true King, the one who would come to redeem us all be from such a man? For if the Christ came to be the ultimate sacrifice, He had to be sinless. But He had to understand all of our sins. And what better way to understand both sin, repentance AND redemption but to be descended from one who at every turn stumbled, but spent time on his knees seeking God’s forgiveness before getting up and going on? Maybe that is what made him a ‘man after God’s own heart’. That time between falling in sin and getting back up-time spent on his knees in repentance, seeking forgiveness before accepting redemption. And so what if it was a cycle? I can’t help but think at every fall, every stumble that he learned and grew. And the culmination-that his descendant would be the one who was sinless-that needed no reason to kneel other than obedience to the Father. That is what made David the man he was, and the honor of knowing that one of the titles of Christ was ‘Son of David’.

Once in royal David’s city

Stood a lowly cattle shed

Where a mother laid her baby

In a  manger for His bed:

Mary was that mother mild, 

Jesus Christ her little child.

-Once In Royal David’s City, written by Cecil Frances Alexander, 1848