Miles McKee Ministries
Box 353, Ponte Vedra Beach, Jacksonville, Florida 32004-0353
PO Box 8, New Ross, County Wexford, Ireland
(The Gospel the New Birth and the Spirit! continued)
”Excuse me, is that the sign?”
“Yes that’s the sign…that’s how you’ll find the Babe. That’s how you’ll know Him from other babies born this night. He’s the baby in the cow shed wrapped in shredded bandages. So don’t bother looking for Him in a fine house or in the suite at the Inn. Look in the cattle shed, that’s where you will find the Savior of the world.”
Yes, what an unlikely sign……….. The Savior Messiah…. born in a stable….too improbable! But there He lies in a manger---a feeding trough for cattle…..and it’s a sign for you and a sign for me. I think the shepherds were shocked by this sign. Surely the sign must be wrong. How could God come to this earth wrapped in abject poverty?
But before we go any further let me ask you, does it shock you that God, when He became human, should come to earth as a baby and be placed in a feeding trough for cattle? With the Spirit’s help it will shock us and thus He prepares us for yet another shock and that is to know that the man who is God will later hang naked, wounded and bleeding on a cross as He endures the wrath of outraged holiness for the sins of His people. The whole thing is shocking! It’s shocking that we should sin against Him in the first place. It’s shocking that, even when we know His mercy, we still continue in our self will to sin against Him. It’s shocking that we think so little of His love and grace and it’s shocking that He should continually and abundantly give us back grace upon grace. I’m both horribly shocked by my performance and wonderfully shocked by His. This awe that any of us have for Him is only possible by the working of the Spirit in our lives.
What a sign! Only the Holy Spirit can minister the power of it to us. Here lies the Lord of Glory without any Glory. Here lies the Eternal Word, who spoke His word and created the heavens; yet here He sleeps, an infant unable to speak. As Lancelot Andrews said, “Here lies the Word without a word.”
He has indeed been made lower than the angels for although He is destined to sit on the throne of His father David (Luke 1:32), He is placed in a simple feeding trough.
We would all do well to listen closely with the Spirit’s help to this sign for it is a speaking sign. It tells us about the character of Jesus. Again Andrews says, “This sign is a pulpit and a sermon for it directs us to the one who said, “Learn of me for I am meek and lowly and you shall find rest unto your souls” (Matt 11:29).
If we have found him, the Holy Spirit is at work. If the Spirit is at work we will also learn from Christ, and if we learn of Him we will become like Him.
May we all be filled with the Spirit so that we can see and know Jesus!
If only we would allow the Spirit to magnify Christ! Instead we chase after supposed deep things which in reality are very shallow. Failing to grasp that Christ is the ‘deep things’ of God, church after church leapfrogs over the Gospel and into the Upper Room in the name of pursuing the Spirit! We must ask therefore which Spirit they are pursuing. If the Spirit doesn’t lead to an exalted and pre-eminent Christ, then it is not the Holy Spirit of God. In 1 Corinthians 2:10 we read, “The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God." We can do no better than quote what JC Philpot says of this verse: He writes,
”Excuse me, is that the sign?”
“Yes that’s the sign…that’s how you’ll find the Babe. That’s how you’ll know Him from other babies born this night. He’s the baby in the cow shed wrapped in shredded bandages. So don’t bother looking for Him in a fine house or in the suite at the Inn. Look in the cattle shed, that’s where you will find the Savior of the world.”
Yes, what an unlikely sign……….. The Savior Messiah…. born in a stable….too improbable! But there He lies in a manger-
But before we go any further let me ask you, does it shock you that God, when He became human, should come to earth as a baby and be placed in a feeding trough for cattle? With the Spirit’s help it will shock us and thus He prepares us for yet another shock and that is to know that the man who is God will later hang naked, wounded and bleeding on a cross as He endures the wrath of outraged holiness for the sins of His people. The whole thing is shocking! It’s shocking that we should sin against Him in the first place. It’s shocking that, even when we know His mercy, we still continue in our self will to sin against Him. It’s shocking that we think so little of His love and grace and it’s shocking that He should continually and abundantly give us back grace upon grace. I’m both horribly shocked by my performance and wonderfully shocked by His. This awe that any of us have for Him is only possible by the working of the Spirit in our lives.
What a sign! Only the Holy Spirit can minister the power of it to us. Here lies the Lord of Glory without any Glory. Here lies the Eternal Word, who spoke His word and created the heavens; yet here He sleeps, an infant unable to speak. As Lancelot Andrews said, “Here lies the Word without a word.”
He has indeed been made lower than the angels for although He is destined to sit on the throne of His father David (Luke 1:32), He is placed in a simple feeding trough.
We would all do well to listen closely with the Spirit’s help to this sign for it is a speaking sign. It tells us about the character of Jesus. Again Andrews says, “This sign is a pulpit and a sermon for it directs us to the one who said, “Learn of me for I am meek and lowly and you shall find rest unto your souls” (Matt 11:29).
If we have found him, the Holy Spirit is at work. If the Spirit is at work we will also learn from Christ, and if we learn of Him we will become like Him.
May we all be filled with the Spirit so that we can see and know Jesus!
If only we would allow the Spirit to magnify Christ! Instead we chase after supposed deep things which in reality are very shallow. Failing to grasp that Christ is the ‘deep things’ of God, church after church leapfrogs over the Gospel and into the Upper Room in the name of pursuing the Spirit! We must ask therefore which Spirit they are pursuing. If the Spirit doesn’t lead to an exalted and pre-
“The Spirit of God in a man's bosom searches the deep things of God, so as to lead him into a spiritual and experimental knowledge of them. What a depth in the blood of Christ—how it "cleanses from all sin,"—even millions of millions of the foulest sins of the foulest sinners! What a depth in His bleeding, dying love, that could stoop so low to lift us so high! What a depth in His pity and compassion to extend itself to such guilty, vile transgressors as we are! What depth in His rich, free, and sovereign grace, that it should super-
The early disciples didn’t turn the world upside down by telling people about their experiences of the Spirit. No! The real Holy Spirit makes believers Christ conscious not Spirit conscious. He will, however, draw us to Christ to make us more like Christ. As Paul writes in 2 COR 3:18,
“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
The Spirit filled life is a joyful life. There is immense peace and joy in knowing Christ has died and has taken responsibility for our sins. There’s joy in knowing that God is for us and not against us. There are times of near elation knowing that our righteousness is secure, in a person in Heaven and that now, because of grace, we are joint heirs with Christ Jesus. But in spite of all the wonderful feelings we should never let them be at the center of our life. Feelings are subjective and no one is saved by them. No one can live before God with any measure of security based on feelings. But the Holy Spirit comes to us in the Gospel and makes Christ’s experience for us the foundation of all our hope
Being filled with the Spirit we can sing with full faith,
“My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus blood and righteousness
I dare not trust the sweetest frame
But wholly lean on Jesus name
On Christ the solid rock I stand
All other ground is sinking sand
All other ground is sinking sand.”
And that’s the Gospel Truth!
Permission is given by the author, Miles McKee, to copy this article if it is done in its entirety without any changes.
