We have talked before about the central mystery of Christianity, of its inherent paradox, that things are backwards from what we think they are, or that two things that can’t be the same, are. He who would lose his life must find it. The first shall be last. Life from death. Weakness is strength. What is meant for evil is good. Victory from suffering. We find these kinds of themes throughout scripture.
Nowhere, however is the paradox more pointed than when we focus on the person of Jesus. During these next three weeks of Advent we will be taking a personal look at Him in the three Gospel accounts of His coming. Mark picks up Jesus at his baptism, so we won’t be looking at Mark. Matthew starts with Jesus’ family tree, tells how Jesus was conceived, something of his family politics and gives some interesting events that occurred when he was a very small child, but skips all the details of the birth. Luke gives us all the details, not only of Jesus’ birth, but of John the Baptist’s as well and fixes Jesus’ place in the historical record.