By Charles Spurgeon
A Sermon (No. 57)
Delivered on Sabbath Morning, December 23rd, 1855, by the
REV. C. H. Spurgeon
At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.
"But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah, though thou be
little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth
unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been
from of old, from everlasting."—Micah 5:2.
HIS
is the season of the year when, whether we wish it or not, we are
compelled to think of the birth of Christ. I hold it to be one of the
greatest absurdities under heaven to think that there is any religion in
keeping Christmas-day. There are no probabilities whatever that our
Saviour Jesus Christ was born on that day, and the observance of it is
purely of Popish origin; doubtless those who are Catholics have a right
to hallow it, but I do not see how consistent Protestants can account it
in the least sacred. However, I wish there were ten or a dozen
Christmas-days in the year; for there is work enough in the world, and a
little more rest would not hurt labouring people. Christmas-day is
really a boon to us; particularly as it enables us to assemble round the
family hearth and meet our friends once more. Still, although we do not
fall exactly in the track of other people, I see no harm in thinking of
the incarnation and birth of the Lord Jesus. We do not wish to be
classed with those
"Who with more care keep holiday
The wrong, than others the right way."
The
old Puritans made a parade of work on Christmas-day, just to show that
they protested against the observance of it. But we believe they entered
that protest so completely, that we are willing, as their descendants,
to take the good accidentally conferred by the day, and leave its
superstitions to the superstitious.
To proceed at once to what we have to say to you: we notice, first,
who it was that sent Christ forth. God the Father here speaks, and says, "Out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be the ruler in Israel." Secondly,
where did he come to at the time of his incarnation? Thirdly,
what did he come for? "To be ruler in Israel." Fourthly,
had he ever come before? Yes, he had. "Whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting."
I.
First, then, WHO SENT JESUS CHRIST? The answer is returned to us by the
words of the text. "Out of thee" saith Jehovah, speaking by the mouth
of Micah, "Out of thee shall he come forth unto me." It is a sweet
thought that Jesus Christ, did not come forth without his Father's
permission, authority, consent, and assistance. He was sent of the
Father, that he might be the Saviour of men. We are, alas! too apt to
forget that while there are distinctions as to the persons in the
Trinity, there are no distinctions of honor; and we do very frequently
ascribe the honor of our salvation, or at least the depths of its mercy
and the extremity of its benevolence, more to Jesus Christ than we do to
the Father. This is a very great mistake. What if Jesus came? Did not
his Father send him? If he was made a child did not the Holy Ghost beget
him? If he spake wondrously, did not his Father pour grace into his
lips, that he might be an able minister of the new covenant? If his
Father did forsake him when he drank the bitter cup of gall, did he not
love him still? and did he not, by-and by, after three days, raise him
from the dead, and at last receive him up on high, leading captivity
captive? Ah! beloved, he who knoweth the Father, and the Son, and the
Holy Ghost as he should know them, never setteth one before another; he
is not more thankful to one than the other; he sees them at Bethlehem,
at Gethsemane, and on Calvary, all equally engaged in the work of
salvation. "He shall come forth unto me." O Christian, hast thou put thy
confidence in the man Christ Jesus? Hast thou placed thy reliance
solely on him? And art thou united with him? Then believe that thou art
united unto the God of heaven; since to the man Christ Jesus thou art
brother and holdest closest fellowship, thou art linked thereby with God
the Eternal, and "the Ancient of days" is thy Father and thy friend.
"He shall come forth unto
me". Did you never see the depth of
love there was in the heart of Jehovah, when God the Father equipped his
Son for the great enterprise of mercy?
There
had been a sad day in Heaven once before, when Satan fell, and dragged
with him a third of the stars of heaven, and when the Son of God
launching from his great right hand the Omnipotent thunders, dashed the
rebellious crew to the pit of perdition; but if we could conceive a
grief in heaven, that must have been a sadder day, when the Son of the
Most High left his Father's bosom, where he had lain from before all
worlds. "Go," saith the Father, "and thy Father's blessing on thy head!"
Then comes the unrobing. How do angels crowd around to see the Son of
God take off his robes He laid aside his crown; he said, "My father, I
am Lord over all, blessed for ever, but I will lay my crown aside, and
be as mortal men are." He strips himself of his bright vest of glory;
"Father," he says, "I will wear a robe of clay, just such as men wear."
Then he takes off all those jewels wherewith he was glorified; he lays
aside his starry mantles and robes of light, to dress himself in the
simple garments of the peasant of Galilee. What a solemn disrobing that
must have been! And next, can you picture the dismissal! The angels
attend the Saviour through the streets, until they approach the doors:
when an angel cries, "Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lifted
up ye everlasting doors, and let the king of glory through!" Oh!
methinks the angels must have wept when they lost the company of
Jesus—when the Sun of Heaven bereaved them of all its light. But they
went after him. They descended with him; and when his spirit entered
into flesh and he became a babe, he was attended by that mighty host of
angels, who after they had been with him to Bethlehem's manger, and seen
him safely, laid on his mother's breast, in their journey upwards
appeared to the shepherds and told them that he was born king of the
Jews.
The Father sent him! Contemplate that subject. Let your soul get hold of it, and in every period of his life think that he suffered what
the Father
willed; that every step of his life was marked with the approval of the
great I AM. Let every thought that you have of Jesus be also connected
with the eternal, ever-blessed God; for "he," saith Jehovah, "shall come
forth unto me." Who sent him, then? The answer is, his Father.
II.
Now, secondly, WHERE DID HE COME TO? A word or two concerning
Bethlehem. It seemed meet and right that our Saviour should be born in
Bethlehem and that because of Bethlehem's history, Bethlehem's name, and
Bethlehem's position—little in Judah.
1. First, it seemed necessary that Christ should be born in Bethlehem,
because of Bethlehem's history.
Dear to every Israelite was the little village of Bethlehem. Jerusalem
might outshine it in splendour; for there stood the temple, the glory of
the whole earth, and "beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole
earth was Mount Zion;" yet around Bethlehem there clustered a number of
incidents which always made it a pleasant resting-place to every Jewish
mind; and even the Christian cannot help loving Bethlehem. The first
mention, I think, that we have of Bethlehem is a sorrowful one. There
Rachel died. If you turn to the 35th of Genesis you will find it said in
the 16th verse—"And they journeyed from Bethel; and there was but a
little way to come to Ephrath; and Rachel travailed, and she had hard
labour. And it came to pass, when she was in hard labour, that the
midwife said unto her, Fear not; thou shalt have this son also. And it
came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died) that she
called his name Ben-oni: but his father called him Benjamin. And Rachel
died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. And
Jacob set a pillar upon her grave, that is the pillar of Rachel's grave
unto this day." A singular incident this—almost prophetic. Might not
Mary have called her own son Jesus, her Ben-oni; for he was to be the
child of Sorrow? Simeon said to her—"Yea, a sword shall pierce through
thine own soul also, that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed."
But while she might have called him Ben-oni, what did God his Father
call him?
Benjamin, the son of my right hand. Ben-oni
was he as a man; Benjamin as to his Godhead. This little incident seems
to be almost a prophecy that Ben-oni—Benjamin, the Lord Jesus, should be
born in Bethlehem. But another woman makes this place celebrated. That
woman's name was Naomi. There lived at Bethlehem in after days, when,
perhaps, the stone that Jacob's fondness had raised had been covered
with moss and its inscription obliterated, another woman named Naomi.
She too was a daughter of joy, and yet a daughter of bitterness. Naomi
was a woman whom the Lord had loved and blessed, but she had to go to a
strange land; and she said, "Call me not Naomi (pleasant) but let my
name be called Mara (bitter) for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly
with me." Yet was she not alone amid all her losses, for there cleaved
unto her Ruth the Moabitess, whose Gentile blood should unite with the
pure untainted stream of the Jew, and should thus bring forth the Lord
our Saviour, the great king both of Jews and Gentiles. That very
beautiful book of Ruth had all its scenery laid in Bethlehem. It was at
Bethlehem that Ruth went forth to glean in the fields of Boaz; it was
there that Boaz looked upon her, and she bowed herself before her lord;
it was there her marriage was celebrated; and in the streets of
Bethlehem did Boaz and Ruth receive a blessing which made them fruitful
so that Boaz became the father of Obed, and Obed the father of Jesse,
and Jesse the father of David. That last fact gilds Bethlehem with
glory—the fact that David was born there—the mighty hero who smote the
Philistine giant, who led the discontented of his land away from the
tyranny of their monarch, and who afterwards, by a full consent of a
willing people, was crowned king of Israel and Judah. Bethlehem was a
royal city, because the kings were there brought forth. Little as
Bethlehem was, it was much to be esteemed; because it was like certain
principalities which we have in Europe, which are celebrated for nothing
but for bringing forth the consorts of the royal families of England.
It was right, then, from history, that Bethlehem should be the
birth-place of Christ.
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