We have had the forerunner of Jesus and the announcement of the birth of Jesus. But now this chapter opens with a providential event which we find nowhere else in the gospels, and yet which explains a fact that is found in the first gospel as well as in the third. Jesus was born in Bethlehem. His parents were in the habit of living in Galilee. How then, if the ordinary residence of His parents was at Nazareth, which was at one extremity of the land, could He be born at Bethlehem which was almost at the other?
“And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed (or enrolled).” Caesar Augustus was the then Emperor of Rome, the last human kingdom of Daniel. Even the holy land was put in subjection to these imperial powers, and Caesar used his power and marked it in this that he demanded the presence of every man in his own city, as if all belonged to him. It was a testimony to the total subjection of the habitable world to himself, not to Christ. This indeed will in due time be according to God, the fruit of His own power, when Jesus is manifestly exalted and God's direct power is vested in His hands, who, being Himself a divine person as well as man, will thus exercise all the power as man, yet without derogating in the smallest degree from the rights and authority of God, yea, displaying them gloriously before the world, as He has already established them before God and to faith in the cross.
With Caesar Augustus however it was far different. Even the people of God were placed in servitude; and wonderful to say, the mother of the Messiah was among those, as well as His legal father, who had to pay obedience to the decree of the Roman Emperor. They went up accordingly for the census to their own city, the city of David, Bethlehem, thus accomplishing the prophecies. And what made it the more remarkable is that in verse 2 we are told that “the census itself first took place when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.” It was not effected at the time here in view as proposed, but was sufficiently carried out to call the parents of our Lord from Nazareth in Galilee to Bethlehem, which accomplished not man's census, but God's prophecy. God took care that it should be just fulfilled enough to carry out His purposes. It was not till some years afterward that Cyrenius was governor of Syria. Then it was carried into effect fully; but meanwhile all went up to be enrolled, each to his own city.
Therefore “Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem (because he was of the house and lineage of David), to be enrolled with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.” From the time that a woman among the Jews was espoused, she was considered legally the wife of him to whom she was betrothed. Thus the Lord while really Son of His mother Mary, was legally of Joseph; and both Joseph and Mary were of the royal line. The Lord Jesus therefore represented David on both sides; but, as the law required, He was the descendant of Solomon on the legal side. For no matter how unquestionably He might have been the Son of Mary, descended from the Nathan stem, He could not have been according to law the Messiah as long as there was a living representative of the Solomon branch. But the Lord, being the legally reputed Son of Joseph as well as Mary's Child, was precisely so descended as to be in every required respect “David's Son,” the Messiah. I say this quite independently of His divine glory which was demanded for other and far deeper reasons.
Thus then “while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in the manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.” Luke always loves to present moral features. Accordingly there is an intimation very instructive for us in the circumstance that it was in the manger Jesus was laid, not in the inn. There was no room for them in the inn. The Lord of glory when born into this world was laid in the manger. What a picture of the state of the world! There was no room for Him who was God in the world! The children of men according to their means found their place in the inn as it suited them. Those who had money could command a place proportioned to what they were willing to pay. But the parents of the Lord were in such poverty as to be thoroughly despised at the inn, and the only place where they could find a shelter for the Babe was a manger.
But this did not hinder the outflow of divine grace any more than it could deny, except to unbelief, the divine glory of Him who was laid there. Unbelief never receives that the Lord of heaven and earth could be born in such circumstances and of such parents. In fact to be born at all, to be really a man, to know beyond all other men the bitterness of the world, the scorn and hatred of men, and finally the cross—all this is utterly stumbling to unbelief. But this is just the truth of God, and the only truth that really makes known God or delivers man. And those that receive it are the simple. Grace makes them such, especially the lowly. It can make the proudest simple, no doubt; but it addresses itself in particular as the rule (and Luke marks the fact) to those that are despised on the earth as Christ was.
“And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them and the glory of the Lord shone round about them and they were sore afraid.” Nevertheless there was no reason. Man, because he is a sinner, is afraid of God, but in truth “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” The angel in the spirit of this says, “Fear not, for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be” —but not exactly “to all people.” For although Luke does finally proclaim the saving grace that goes out to all men, he begins within the strict limits of Israel, and shows God faithful to His people and willing to accomplish all His promises if they would receive Jesus. But they would not, and therefore God was morally justified in turning from the despising Jews to the Gentiles. The true way of understanding this clause is, “which shall be to all the people,” meaning the people of Israel. This is confirmed in the next verse. “For unto you is born this, day, in the city of David, a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.” It was the Anointed of God that their fathers had long waited and looked for. The Child was now born, the Son given, and unto them, as said the prophet.
“And this shall be a sign unto you; ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.” “A babe” it should be. And so it was: a most significant sign—a Messiah, not in power and glory as the Jews expected, but a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, who in grace was subject to all the realities of the circumstances of a human birth and infancy, and who was found in fact, as to external position, lying in a manger.
But if such was the place of obscurity that He entered, all the world being really out of course and God unwilling to allow such a thought as a sanction by His Son of the state of men in sin, if He gives Him therefore a place as it were outside, on the other hand there was suddenly “with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will in men.” This is comprising in a few words the whole scope of divine purpose. The manifestation of the Son, now man, leads to this, not exactly the moral ground of it, or the means by which it will be brought about, but the result as illustrating to their unjealous eyes, God's good pleasure in men (not angels). First of all, there is “Glory to God in the highest.” Up to the birth of Jesus, all had been disappointment in man. The creature had broken down under the best circumstances, and every attempt by any other means to correct it had brought either destruction to men or rebellion against God, growing worse and worse. The deluge had not mended the world, but simply destroyed men. The law had only aggravated the condition of man, provoking their sin into open transgression and sealing them up in condemnation.
But the birth of the Lord Jesus is at once the signal for the angels to sing, “Glory to God in the highest.” It would not be merely glory to God below, but in the highest, throughout the entire universe of God, and expressly in its highest places—glory to God at length everywhere. On earth, where nothing but war had been against God, and with man, confusion, misery, and rebellion— “On earth peace.” Nothing less than this would ensue from the birth of the Messiah, though not all at once; but the heavenly host take in the magnificent issues of His birth who is father of the age to come. That birth, too, was the expression that God's complacency is in men. There could not be a greater proof of God's good pleasure than this; for the Son of God did not become an angel but a man. He was God from all eternity, but He became man. This bore witness, irrefragable and evident to every one who reflects, what an object of love men were to God. The heavenly host therefore only sing of these great outlines. They do not enter into detail; perhaps they did not know how any one was to be brought about. But the great fact was there before them; the Lord from heaven was this babe, the object of contempt to man, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger, perhaps as no other babe was. No wonder it drew out the loudest songs of the angels. They see God's glory in it; they see men thus the object of His infinite love and condescension; they anticipate peace for the earth, spite of all appearances, spite of Caesar Augustus or his decrees, spite of the Roman armies, those massive iron hammers that battered down the nations, the beast that trampled what it could not devour—spite of all this, “Peace on earth.” They looked at things as the scene for displaying in man (because the Son was now man) God's glory and grace; and they were right.
When the unwonted vision passed away, the shepherds say one to another, “Let us now go even unto Bethlehem and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known to us. And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.”
Thus, in their artless way, they acted upon what was made known to them, upon the report of the angels; and when they had proved its truth, they spread the news. They were anticipating thus far the way of grace. Tidings of such great goodness and joy could not be, ought not to be, confined to the breasts of those to whom it was first communicated. They made it known wherever they could. “But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.” A deeper feeling no doubt wrought in her mind. The time was not come for the propagation of the gospel which was in store: the basis for it was not even laid. But she who must needs have been intimately interested in the wonders that surrounded her—she weighed all, and treasured it all up in her heart. The shepherds, too, simple men, favored as they had been of God, returned, glorifying and praising Him “for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.”