When people ask about Jesus the Son of God’s First Coming, here’s a favorite Scripture I use:
To us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on His shoulders. He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the greatness of His government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this. (Isaiah 9:6-7)
Maybe you’ve heard these words in Handel’s “Messiah.” But thousands of years before Handel and 700 years before Jesus’ first advent, God spoke these words about His only begotten Son.
God’s Son became flesh and changed the course of human history. Art, music, literature, and civilization changed. Our whole understanding of ourselves and our world changed when God came down. Billions have believed on and followed Jesus over the past 2,000 years. He’s given us a new way of understanding life and a new way of living.
In the super-miracle of Christ’s Incarnation, our very Creator, Preserver, and Judge, becomes our Kinsman, Sinbearer, and Redeemer! Of all miracles and mysteries, this is the most staggering. (J. Sidlow Baxter)
The early Christians did not say in dismay, “Look what the world has come to!” but in delight, “Look Who has come to the world!” (Carl F. H. Henry)
Billy Sunday (1862-1935) claimed the Bible contains 256 names for Christ the Lord because He is infinitely beyond all that any one name can express. Only these four are mentioned in Isaiah 9:6-7.
Jesus Is Our Wonderful Counselor
We need Christ’s wisdom desperately. For all our education, we are often very misguided and inconsistent people. We have more information at our fingertips than ever, but less wisdom in our heads and hearts than previous generations. Our world is running further and further from God’s truth, and His standards of right and wrong, good and evil. Messiah Jesus has come to show us the path of salvation—the route back to God. He says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”1
Christ has come down to direct, guide, and instruct us in righteousness. He sends His Holy Spirit to mold believers according to His Bible truth. So let’s take heart. If Jesus is our Wonderful Counselor in these confusing times, and if we live by His words, we will never be led astray. Let us hear and heed Jesus today and always!
Christ says in Proverbs: I offer you wisdom, instruction, and words of insight. I teach you prudent behavior for doing what is right and just and fair. I help ordinary people to be smart, and young people to gain knowledge and good sense. I call the wise to listen to Me and become wiser. I give guidance to all kinds of people. (Proverbs 1:2-5, my paraphrase)
Christ Is the Mighty God
Jesus is unlike any other religious leader. Buddha, Confucius, Mohammed, and Socrates never claimed to be God. But Jesus asserts, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am… I and the Father are one… Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father.”2 Christ is God Himself! Not just a great teacher or perfect moral example. He is equal to God the Father and God the Holy Spirit in power, glory, and eternity.
The important point is not whether we can understand the Holy Trinity, even with the help of illustrations, but whether we will believe what the Bible has to say about the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and about their relationship to each other. (James M. Boice)
This truth of Christ’s deity (His God-ness) is essential because all human beings are estranged from the Lord and break His law by what we do or fail to do. Only God Himself, in Messiah Jesus, can make atonement for our sins by His sinless life, death on the cross, and bodily resurrection. Only Christ can save and salvage us from our self-destruction. Sin and death, hell and the devil, are too strong for us to overcome ourselves. We will always be overwhelmed. But if Jesus is our Mighty God, we share in His victory that overcomes the world!
Jesus is Immanuel, meaning “God with us.” He who lived in heaven, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father and the Spirit, willingly descended into our world. He breathed our air, felt our pain, knew our sorrows, and died for our sins. Christ didn’t come to scare us, but to bring us into His safety and security. So let us call on and come to Jesus today and always!
Christ Is the Everlasting Father
Scripture says: “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear (respect, reverence) Him. For He knows how weak we are. He remembers we are only dust.”3 Jesus is able to sympathize and empathize with us because for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet He did not sin.4 How amazing that our Mighty God stoops down to love and comfort us! He shows favor, grace, kindness, and mercy to all who run to Him!
The stunning thing is that the Lord considered our needs and our relationship to Him so precious that He went through the trauma of changing places. In Jesus, God came down the stairs of Heaven to save us. (Joe Stowell)
Jesus is not fickle in dealing with us. He is everlastingly faithful to provide for us, pardon us, protect us, and preserve us. Christ is not in a grave somewhere. He is risen and alive right now, the same yesterday, today, and forever.5 Compared to the consequences of sin and self-centeredness, Christ’s yoke is easy and His burden is light. He gives rest for our souls. So let’s keep on turning to and trusting Jesus!
Christ Is the Prince of Peace
We pray for military peace around the world, and that’s good and right. Yet we easily forget that we need peace with God even more urgently. When we reject the Lord and His way of life, it’s an act of rebellion against Him. It’s declaring war against the holy, holy, holy God who created us and loves us. Our wrong thinking, speaking, and doing, provoke Him to anger. Yet, as Messiah and Mediator, the Lord Jesus has made peace with God for all who repent of their sins and follow Him. The creche in Bethlehem leads Christ to Calvary’s cross.
God in all His fullness was pleased to live in Christ, and through Jesus, God reconciled everything to Himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross. (Colossians 1:19-20)
On the cross, Jesus purchased peace for His people by dying sacrificially in our place. If Christ is our Lord and Savior, we have pardon, cleansing from sin, and a peace that endures forever! But we can’t have God’s peace without a saving relationship with Prince Jesus.
All we could ever imagine, or ever hope for, Jesus is. He is the Prince of Peace whose first coming has already transformed individuals and societies. And His second coming will bring permanent justice and righteousness. This is what Christians celebrate at Christmas and all year long. All this, and infinitely more. The Son of God comes down as a baby into a poor family to be born in a barn. It’s a place where you’d least expect to find anything you want. But in Jesus, you find everything you could ever want and all that you need. (Songwriter Michael Card)
Christ gave everything for us, beloved. Love so amazing and divine demands our soul, our life, and our all in following Him. Will you give yourself to Jesus for the first time or again?
Notes (various Bible translations): 1 John 14:6. 2 John 8:58, 10:30, 14:9. 3 Psalm 103:13-14. 4 Heb 4:15. 5 Heb 13:8.
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Christ: His Wonderful Names (Part 1)
Jesus: Our Wonderful Counselor
Jesus: Our Mighty God
Jesus: Our Everlasting Father (Part 1)
Christ: His Wonderful Names (Part 1)