The English-American poet W.H. Auden once wrote, “Nothing
that is possible can save us. We who
must die demand a miracle.”
And that is exactly what we, who must one day die,
received at a place called Bethlehem over 2000 years ago.
Most of us have seen just enough Christmas plays that
we don’t even think about Bethlehem, the town where Jesus was born, as being
anything more than a nondescript Jewish town full of mean prejudiced
inn-keepers with over-crowded motels. We easily fail to recognize how shameful Christ’s birth
in Bethlehem really was—in the eyes of anyone living during that time. But more importantly, we lose the connection between
Bethlehem and Calvary that clearly marked the Baby Jesus’ path to Mt. Moriah
where most of the thousands of residents born in Bethlehem also ended their
earthly lives.
Yet, Bethlehem, correctly understood, yields spiritual
nuggets which, if quarried out of their many layers of historical and cultural
strata, expose even deeper tiers of the
divine drama the Bible calls the Gospel.
Bethlehem was not much of a town with a population
between 300 and 1000 people—most of them shepherds, stone workers, and wheat
farmers. Located about five miles south of Jerusalem, Bethlehem
is first mentioned in the Bible as the place where Jacob was going when he
buried his wife Rachael in Genesis 35:19. It was the setting for the story of Ruth who became the
wife of Boaz and the great grandmother of King David and one of Jesus’ earthly
ancestors. Bethlehem was the town David was born and grew up in
and become known as the City of David.
The small town was known for its wheat fields—hundreds
of acres of fields of wheat grew in and around Bethlehem giving her the
nickname “House of Bread” which, is what Bethlehem means. It was also famous for being the town where literally
tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of sheep were raised and kept
for Passover as well as the daily sacrifices of the Temple in Jerusalem.
But more than anything else, Bethlehem was known as the
city in which the Messiah would be born—that eternal King Who would come from
Heaven to save His people from their sins. The prophecy is found in Micah 5:2, written over 700 years before the birth of Christ.
“But
you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming
forth is from of old, from ancient days.”
So, it was no accident that a census ordered by Caesar
Augustus required Joseph, the carpenter engaged to be married to Mary who was
pregnant with Jesus, to return to his hometown which just happened to be
Bethlehem. God wanted Jesus to be born in Bethlehem. You know the story.
It’s found in Luke 2:1-20.
Once there Mary gives birth to Jesus and lays Him in a
manger or feeding trough because there was no room for them in the inn. But then Luke transitions in his story to shepherds and
their sheep that were in the wheat fields of Bethlehem. In telling us in Luke
2:8 that there were shepherds in the fields keeping watch over their flocks
by night, Luke is giving us clues about Jesus and the significance of the sheep
in Bethlehem’s fields.
Being 21st-century Westerners thinking and living in an
urbanized, industrialized culture, we easily miss the importance of these
contextual clues. But, if we were first-century Middle Eastern villagers
reading this text, we would wonder why sheep were in the fields at night. Normal practice would be that village sheep were kept
in sheepfolds at night for protection. But there were two reasons why this was not the case at
Jesus’ birth. The first reason was that the sheep were allowed in the
wheat fields around Bethlehem after the wheat harvest and before the next
planting so they could fertilize the soil with their manure. And the second reason for the sheep being in the fields
at night instead of in protective sheep enclosures was that there were simply
too many sheep and lambs to house anywhere.
You see, these are special lambs being raised to supply
the humongous need for Passover lambs that would be sacrificed at Passover as
well as the two lambs needed every day for the perpetual sacrifice, known as the
Tamid. The best estimates suggest that over 200,000 newborn lambs
were needed every year to care for theses sacrifices. Thus, the flocks of sheep and their lambs were so
sizable that no sheepfold was large enough to hold them for night-time
protection. They had to remain in the fields at night—where they
were born.
So, on the same night that Jesus – the Lamb of God –
was born in the manger which was really nothing more than a vacant sheepfold in
a cave, lambs destined for the Passover sacrifice and the daily sacrifices were
also being born in Bethlehem’s wheat fields. Wow! The connection between Christmas and Easter is
already being established.
Luke’s narrative continues with the “Good News” of the
birth of Jesus being first announced to these shepherds who were employed by
the Temple priests.
While Psalm 23 portrays the role of a shepherd in a
most honorable way, by the time of Jesus, shepherding was viewed as a despised
profession. It was considered unclean for two reasons—because
caring for sheep in the outdoors was a dirty occupation and because the 24/7
care the shepherds needed to provide the sheep kept them from observing the
Sabbath. Many rabbis during this time held that shepherds,
because of the wandering nature of their profession could never keep the
Sabbath and thus the religious culture of that day considered shepherds
reprehensible people practicing a shameful profession.
It was to just this kind of a hopeless person living in
chronic state of cultural and religious shame that God directed the angels to
announce His incredible Good News! But even more interesting and often overlooked than the
shame of the shepherds was the shameful treatment Joseph received upon arriving
in Bethlehem—his hometown! He went back to Bethlehem because that was where his
family originated. It was where his ancestors had lived—where his
grandparents lived as well as his parents. He had relatives there—friends—and acquaintances. Bethlehem was his home turf. Yet, you’d hardly know it by the way he was treated
when he arrived with a young pregnant woman on a donkey in tow.
Wouldn’t you find it astounding for a young man with
his pregnant wife to arrive in his hometown and not make his way to his
parent’s home or a brother’s home or even a friend’s home to stay the night? But Joseph apparently doesn’t even try. He tries to find a room in an inn but is
refused even there. And the reason for his not going home and for his being
refused at the inn was not so much that there was no room for them in this town—there
was no room for an adulterous woman about to have a baby out of wedlock in this
town! You see, Joseph’s wife, Mary had become pregnant before
she and Joseph were married. The angel Gabriel made it clear to Joseph that the
child in Mary’s womb was conceived by the Holy Spirit of God but
who would ever believe that?! Certainly not his family back in Bethlehem!!! And they didn’t which, is why Joseph and Mary could not
find a place other than a vacant, dirty, dingy sheepfold in an empty cave to
use as Jesus birthing room. Even by 1st Century standards this
was appalling.
Put back into its first-century setting, humanly
speaking, Jesus’ birth was not something to be celebrated—at best it could only
be tolerated as the shameful consequence of Mary’s supposed sin. And Joseph who, as the oldest son in his family, was responsible
for maintaining and even enforcing the family honor had deeply shamed and
offended his family by choosing to marry his pregnant fiancé rather than send
her away or even have her stoned. Thus, while Jesus’ birth was indeed glorious from
Heaven’s perspective, the opposite would have most likely been true for
Joseph’s Davidic clan in Bethlehem.
How appropriate, then, that Jesus’ birth was first
announced to and celebrated by religious outcasts and socially unacceptable shepherds. Jesus’ shameful birth in Bethlehem really sets the
scene for His shameful death in Jerusalem where as far as this city was
concerned—He was crucified as a shameful impostor and liar on a cross between
two thieves.
But Heaven saw it in a completely different light. You see, on the Sunday before the crucifixion—the
Sunday we call “Palm Sunday” when Jesus was enroute to Jerusalem along the road
from Jericho He stopped to stage His approach and entry into Jerusalem just
outside the small village of Bethany two miles east of Jerusalem. He sent two disciples into Bethany to secure the donkey
upon which He would ride into Jerusalem. Then at just the right time He began His final journey
to Jerusalem riding east toward the Mount of Olives where He would stop and
meet up with a huge crowd which included Temple and religious leaders on the
Mount of Olives—the mountain directly east of Jerusalem where the roads from
the village of Bethany and the town of Bethlehem intersected.
But why was there a huge crowd which included Temple
officials and Pharisees on the Mount of Olives when Jesus arrives? Most of us have the idea that they were there to meet
Jesus as He rode into the city of Jerusalem so as to worship Him but I don’t
think so.
You see, on this Sunday—Palm Sunday—tens of thousands
of Passover Lambs were being herded from Bethlehem to the City of Jerusalem for
the Passover celebration on the following Friday. The shepherds had to herd them into the city on
Sunday—an undertaking that would have taken all day so that on Monday the
people could come to the Temple and buy their Passover Lamb.
They would then take this Lamb to their homes or camps
to live with them for four days before killing them on the Passover. But before the shepherds bring all the lambs into the
city they are met by a massive crowd of pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem as well
as by a huge crowd of people from Jerusalem wanting to see the lambs entering
the city.
This was a big event—a celebrative event and this was
the parade route, if you will, into the city. And the Temple officials—the Pharisees were there—not
to meet Jesus but to meet the lambs and lead the vast processional into the
city. But as this processional of literally thousands of
Passover and other sacrificial lambs converges on the Mount of Olives from the
south they meet another processional traveling from the east with none other
than the Lamb of God riding on a donkey. And Luke’s Gospel describes this scene for us in Luke 19:37-38.
37)
When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the
whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all
the miracles they had seen: 38)
“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”
Note that the song the crowd sings sounds very much
like the song sung by the angels at Christ’s birth. There is a slight variation but for the most part this
song sung about Jesus on the Mount of Olives sounds very much like the song
sung by the Angels at His birth. I cannot help but think that the shepherds herding the
lambs up from Bethlehem must have recognized the words and immediately were
taken back to that night in the fields 33 years before.
And as the two processionals now become one with Jesus
taking center stage and the people beginning to sing about Him—the Pharisees
react ordering Jesus to silence the crowd. But listen to Jesus’ response to them. It’s found in Luke 19:40-44.
40)
“I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.” 41)
As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42)
and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring
you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43)
The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against
you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. 44)
They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They
will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time
of God’s coming to you.”
Wow! Jesus
Christ—God the Son—was entering into Jerusalem that day to offer Himself as the
Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of all who believe and He was doing it on
the same day that hundreds of thousands of sacrificial lambs were being herded
into the city.
Jesus then continued on down the Mount of Olives
through the Kidron Valley near the Garden of Gethsemane and up Mt. Moriah to
the city of Jerusalem where He entered the city gates with all the Passover
lambs which would be sacrificed over a two-day period in celebration of the
Passover, some the day before, and
others, on the same day that He was to be sacrificed as the Lamb of God.
Now in going back to Exodus 12, as well as seeing how
the Passover was celebrated in Israel’s history we are able to learn what
requirements a Passover Lamb had to meet if he was to be an acceptable
sacrifice to God on behalf of the people. In summarizing the requirements, the head of each
family had to select a male lamb without any defects or blemishes of any kind. The lamb had to be taken into the family home for a
period of four days prior to its sacrifice so that it could be observed and
examined for any such defects. And at the end of the four day period it was customary
for the head of the household to rise up and declare the lamb clean and without
any defects or blemishes of any kind. At this point the lamb was considered acceptable to God
as a Passover offering.
Jesus also met all of the requirements of the Passover
lamb. Jesus was a male, without defect or blemish upon His
life and character—He was sinless.
Jesus was in Jerusalem four days prior to His execution
and examined scrupulously over and over again by the Scribes, the Pharisees,
the Sadducees, the High Priest, Pilate, King Herod, and Pilate again only to be
found innocent of any crime or sin. And in fact, at the end of those four days the head of all
the households in Jerusalem, the Roman Governor, Pilate stood up and declared
Jesus clean, not just once but three times in John 18:38, 19:4, 19:6. At this point Jesus having met all the requirements
necessary to make Him legally acceptable as the Passover lamb was led away to
be placed on the cross.
But, there was one more requirement for a Passover Lamb
to meet which could not be met until he had died and his body was consumed—not
a single bone in his body could be broken according to Exodus 12:46. Jesus met this requirement as well for as John reports
in His Gospel in chapter 19 and verses 33-36.
33)
But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not
break his legs. 34) But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and
at once there came out blood and water. 35) He who saw it has borne witness—his
testimony is true, and he knows that he is telling the truth—that you also may
believe. 36) For these things took place that the Scripture might be fulfilled:
“Not one of his bones will be broken.”
Jesus is indeed our Passover Lamb. But for what reason? Why did Jesus identify Himself with the Passover Lamb and why did God have Him die at the Passover? Why not Yom Kippur--The Day of Atonement? Why is Jesus identified as our Passover Lamb but not the one sacrificed on Yom Kippur?
As I mentioned before, Jesus was crucified on the day after the Passover Meal was eaten. We know this because He ate the Passover Meal with His disciples the night before He was crucified. On that following day Jesus was nailed to the cross at 9 AM and died at 3 PM the same times that the Tamid or burnt offering for sin was offered in the Temple. The Tamid offering was the twice daily offering of an unblemished lamb for the sins of the people that was offered everyday. It is significant that Jesus was placed upon the cross at the first offering of the day and dies upon the final offering of the day. He was our Tamid Lamb--the sin offering for our sin which puts an end to the priests daily offering of sacrifices which can never take away our sins.
But, on that same day in which Jesus was crucified the priest also sacrificed their Passover Lambs for themselves and their families. This is significant as well. You see, Jesus is the Passover Lamb for another priesthood--a royal priesthood is what Peter calls it made up of those of us who have been redeemed by the Lamb. Thus, Jesus is our Passover Lamb and our Tamid Lamb.
As our Tamid Lamb, He saves us from our sins in the sense of delivering us from the penalty of our sins. As our Passover Lamb, He saves us from our sins in the sense of delivering us from our slavery to sin, Satan, and self. Remember, the Passover is the commemoration of the Hebrews from Egypt. Jesus as our Passover Lamb delivered us from Egypt too. That is He delivered us from our slavery to our old status as slaves to our sin. Furthermore, He is delivering us from our sins each day as He sanctifies us. This is the significance of Jesus as our Passover Lamb.
True "salvation" is being saved from our sins so that we are no longer under sin's penalty nor living any longer under sin's control. Oh, we still struggle with sin but the mark of a true believer is that Jesus is destroying the works of the devil in our lives. Thus, their should be within each believer the desire to pursue righteousness even though beleaguered by unrighteousness.
Jesus died at the same time as the Passover Lambs from
Bethlehem—on the afternoon of the second day of Preparation for the Passover,
in the same city—Jerusalem, and at the hands of the same people—the Religious
Leaders.
The only difference is that they would be sacrificed in
the Temple—but He would be sacrificed outside the city at the place of
shame—the place of the skull—Golgotha—or as we know it—Mount Calvary.
They, the Passover lambs, died in the place of honor
while He, the ultimate sacrificial Lamb of God to whom they all pointed and
pictured, died in the place of shame among shameful people and for shameful
people who have done shameful things.
And this rescuing of shameful people who realize they
are shameful sinners from their shameful ways was God’s desire then and is
God’s desire now. Some things never change. God still forgives, saves, and lifts up those
who ashamed of their sin and ready to be done with it turn to Jesus their
Passover Lamb.
And so W.H. Auden was right, “Nothing that is possible
can save us. We who must die demand a
miracle.”
And Jesus is that Miracle!
Praise God for the Gospel According To Bethlehem!
