Is Christmas Offensive?

by Pastor Paul Wolff

Christmas is the celebration of God’s gift of a savior to redeem us all from our sins

In a Pennsylvania town near Gettysburg, a family was asked to remove a Christmas decoration from in front of their house which prominently displayed the name, Jesus, because one of their neighbors described it as “offensive.” Is Christmas offensive?

I suppose there are many ways to answer this, but the truth is that yes, Christmas can be offensive to some, but the reality of Christmas celebrates the least offensive event in all of history.

First, there are people who misuse the name of Jesus only as a vulgar exclamation. If they see the name of Jesus as vulgar, then they would certainly see His birth as offensive. However, those who only use Christ’s name as a curse word are misusing it, and any offense they give or receive at the name of Jesus is their own fault, and not something that Jesus Himself is responsible for.

Likewise, there are people who would never use Jesus’ name as a vulgar exclamation, or as a curse, and in fact see themselves as good people, and who still might be offended by Christmas. Jesus is God who became incarnate as a person because that was the only way He could redeem us from our sins. Those “good” people who don’t admit to being sinners are offended that the birth of Jesus shows that they aren’t nearly as good as they think they are. They think they don’t need a savior, much less do they think that God Himself had to die to save them from their sins. They think that if God had to die for sinners, it must have been for “other people” who are worse than them. The birth of Jesus offends them because it puts them in the same category as people they despise nearly as much as Jesus.

The temptation to idolatry is the most common temptation that we face. We usually think of idol worship as bowing down to a man-made statue or some kind of false god. However, the most common form of idolatry is to think of one’s self as god. This, in effect, was the temptation which seduced Adam and Eve when they were still in the Garden of Eden. If this temptation corrupted Adam and Eve when they were still innocent, we, who are already corrupted by sin, are much more likely to fall for this temptation and see ourselves as our own god. Wherever this is true, we see the true God as a rival and we take offense at Him in His person, and in His word and works.

Mary heard the word of God and she believed.

In reality, the coming of God into our world as Jesus Christ was the least offensive thing ever to happen in the entire history of everything. At first it was known only to Mary when she heard and believed the words of the angel, Gabriel. Then Mary went to visit her elderly cousin, Elizabeth, who was the recipient of a slightly lesser miracle, but one which was just like the gift of Isaac to Abraham and Sarah in Genesis 21. Elizabeth (and her unborn child) rejoiced the moment she heard Mary greet her (see Luke 1:44).

After three months, when Mary went back to Nazareth and told Joseph the news, he did not rejoice. He was rather offended. He had been faithful and chaste and knew that he had not fathered any child, so when Mary shows up pregnant, he assumed that she had been unfaithful. This was a logical (though wrong) assumption. Ever since the creation of Adam and Eve, all people have been conceived the same way. No virgin, before or since, had ever become a mother. Matthew 1:19 tells us that Joseph had made up his mind to divorce Mary quietly, so as not to put her to shame, but I am sure that in their conversations that day there was more than a few tears shed by both Mary and Joseph. Such was the supposed offense.

That evening and angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and told him, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” To Joseph’s credit he believed the word of God from the angel, even though it was essentially the same thing that Mary had told him earlier which he did not believe. The offense that he had presumed from Mary was so great that he couldn’t bring himself to believe her, at first, because she had every reason to lie if she was, in fact, unfaithful. Yet, when Joseph heard God’s word from the angel, he repented of his disbelief and kept Mary as his wife and continued to refrain from intimate relations with her until an appropriate time after Jesus was born.

The actual birth of Jesus was also most inoffensive. Joseph and Mary had to travel South to Bethlehem to comply with a decree from Caesar Augustus about registering in a census. Even though the Davidic dynasty of kings had ended several hundred years before the days of Joseph and Mary, there were likely many, many Jews of that day who could trace their ancestry back to King David. Remember that David’s youngest son and heir, Solomon, alone had 300 wives and 700 concubines, and surely also fathered more than his fair share of children, though the Scriptures don’t tell us how many children came from these arrangements. Even acknowledging that over the years some of David’s descendants may have lost track of their ancestral line, there surely was quite a crowd that was coming to Bethlehem to register for Caesar’s census. Yet, the birth of the Son of God didn’t put anyone out the night He was born. Instead, Mary and Joseph apparently stayed in a barn (or its equivalent), and placed the newborn baby Jesus in a manger as his first crib. This humble birth was the very opposite of offensive.

Joseph protected his family by taking them to Egypt until the death of Herod

That same night after Jesus was born, angels from God appeared to shepherds near Bethlehem and told them the good news about the birth of God’s Son, and they weren’t offended at all and came and worshiped Him. Likewise, when the Magi saw the star, and interpreted it to mean that a king was born to the Jews, they came to worship Him. However, they logically assumed that the new king was born in Jerusalem and first went there to find the royal baby. King Herod was not a descendant of David, nor a Jew, nor a Levite, nor even a descendant of Israel. When Herod heard about the birth of the King of the Jews, he took offense. Herod didn’t want a Jewish king. He wanted one of his sons (one whom he hadn’t yet killed) to succeed him as king, not a descendant of Judah born in Bethlehem. After the Magi left town without even saying goodbye and identifying the newborn King of the Jews, Herod sent soldiers to Bethlehem to kill all the baby boys younger than two years.


The murderous insanity of Herod shows the tragic foolishness of taking offense at the birth of Jesus. Yet it also reminds us that we shouldn’t be surprised when people take offense at this wonderful event.


The birth of Christ is such an important event in human history that when the Roman empire became a Christian empire after Constantine legalized Christianity, they eventually made an effort to count the years from the birth of Jesus. They likely weren’t perfect in this, and we now believe Jesus was born around 3-4 B.C. as we count the years. The description of the years as B.C. (before Christ) and A.D. (Anno Domini – year of our Lord) also offends people who don’t recognize Christ as Lord and they would rather describe the years as B.C.E. (before the Christian era, or before the “common” era) and C.E.

Jesus was rejected in Nazareth

Besides the birth of Jesus, people took offense at Jesus many times during His ministry. Luke 4:16-30 records the first time Jesus stood up in the synagogue in Nazareth after He was baptized by John and had endured 40 days of fasting and temptation in the wilderness, He read an appointed reading from Isaiah and then said, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” The men who heard this took offense at His words and took him out and intended to throw Him off a cliff, but this was not His time to die, yet, so He somehow miraculously and gently didn’t let them do Him harm and “passing through their midst, he went away.”


John 5 tells of a time when Jesus healed a crippled man on a Sabbath day, and the Pharisees took offense at this. They ought to have rejoiced that Jesus had mercy on this poor man who had been crippled for 38 years. Instead, they were offended that Jesus broke their man-made laws about Sabbath work. They were also offended that such a great miracle would draw the people’s respect and admiration to Him instead of them. Jesus was not breaking God’s laws about the Sabbath because as He told those who were offended, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” They also took offense at this because He was calling God His Father, and showing Himself equal with God. Though they ought to have recognized the evidence that Jesus is God, they instead sought to kill Him.

The idolatrous Jewish priests took offense at Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

Some hard-hearted people even took offense at the raising of Lazarus from the dead (John 11). John 12:9-11 tells us that the chief Priests intended not only to kill Jesus, but to kill Lazarus as well because on account of this wonderful miracle many Jews were going away from their false teaching and following Jesus. They saw Jesus as a threat to their authority among the people and so they were offended.

The bottom line of Christmas is that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” (1 Timothy 1:15) Sinners who resent being reminded of the truth are offended by this. On the other hand, sinners who recognize their desperate situation and see the hope and comfort in God coming to save us from our sin rejoice in the birth of Jesus along with His life and death and resurrection from the dead.

This past year (2017) was one of the most painful years that I have ever experienced. You know it is bad when a broken leg (and subsequent recovery and rehabilitation) was not the worst thing that happened. Yet, the blessings of Christ and His forgiveness and salvation were a comfort to me in sickness and in health, in pain and in pleasure, in sorrow and in joy.

May the forgiveness and salvation that Jesus won for you give you joy and peace and all blessings this Christmas season. May you never take offense at Christ or any of God’s work to redeem you and make you His beloved child. Merry Christmas.

The Humble God

The angel said to [the shepherds], “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” (Luke 2:10-12)

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A “humble God” sounds like an oxymoron, especially when the Holy Scriptures describe God as omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. How can God be humble when He is all-powerful, all-knowing, and present everywhere? Yet, Jesus shows us that God is humble. God does not use His power for His own benefit. Instead He uses His power in a loving way to benefit us – if we will have it.

Many people mistake the humility of God for weakness. This is understandable, but it is a mistake. It is a mistake to think that the true God is weak because one day (soon) each of us will have to stand before God and answer for the sin we have committed against Him. If we imagine that we are stronger than God or greater than Him in any way then we are more likely to reject His solution for our sin.

It is understandable to mistake the humility of God for weakness because when sinful people create false gods, they exaggerate their “powers” so as to make them seem more impressive and frightening. The more powerful a god you seem to have on your side, then the more you can intimidate others to treat you favorably (or otherwise succumb to your wishes). False gods, however, have to be hyped up with hyperbole. They don’t have anything else speaking in their favor, especially the truth.

Jesus had nothing to prove to anyone, and He didn’t try – though many tried to tempt Him to prove Himself. Jesus was (and is) the same almighty God who created the earth, the universe, and everything that exists (except Himself, of course). Jesus didn’t have to prove Himself because Jesus is God. This would remain true even if no one had ever believed Him. So Jesus lived a humble life from beginning to end, simply living His own life so that through His life and death He would win salvation for us.


The humble life of Jesus began with His conception which was, at first, known only to His mother, Mary. By the time Jesus was born only a handful of people knew that God was soon to be born as a baby boy, including Mary and Joseph, and Mary’s elderly cousins, Zechariah and Elizabeth. Thus, when the holy family traveled to Bethlehem for the Imperial Census, no one made any room for the baby Son of God, and He spent His first night after His birth sleeping in a manger, where the livestock would ordinarily have been feeding. No other god on earth would be caught dead lying in a manger, but there was Jesus.
Jesus didn’t come to impress us, or to threaten us, or to “put the fear of God” into us. Though He could rightly have done any of these things, Jesus instead came to save us from the punishment required for our sins. Jesus lived an ordinary, humble life just like any other human being, even though He is God in the flesh.


The humility of Jesus is also shown when He went to be baptized by John, the son of Zechariah. John had been preparing the people to receive Christ by preaching repentance and baptizing for forgiveness of sins. He had truthfully told the people that he was unworthy to untie the shoelaces of the Christ who was soon to be revealed to them. Though God had sent him to preach and baptize in this manner, even John was surprised when Jesus came to be baptized, too.

The baptism of John was for sinners. Jesus was holy and innocent and pure, and had no sin. It could only make Jesus “dirty” to be baptized in the same baptism as the worst sinners. But Jesus didn’t come to earth just to remain “clean” and pure as if He were only here as an example for us to show us that it could be done. That would surely have condemned us because we are unable to undo what has already been done.

I have heard a saying, “For something to become clean, something else must become dirty.” You can’t make something clean with a dirty cloth or dirty water, for example, and our sin makes us filthy dirty inside and out. Jesus came to earth to “fulfill all righteousness” for our benefit, but He also came to “get dirty” with the guilt of our sin so that He could cleanse us from that same sin. So Jesus again humbled himself and insisted that He be baptized like a sinner. Jesus didn’t gain anything for Himself by doing this, but He gained amazing things for us, including full forgiveness of our sins, reconciliation with God, and the hope of everlasting life in paradise. To do this for us it cost Jesus a tremendous amount of shame and suffering and death, but that is what love does – love causes one to care more about others than about one’s self.


This leads us to the final humiliation of Jesus. Once Jesus had taken the guilt of mankind’s sins upon Himself and had completed the work of proclaiming the Gospel and preparing the Apostles to continue His work after He ascended into heaven, then He had to destroy our sins and the death curse that came along with them. Jesus did this by letting sinners do to Him what they wanted. What all sinners want to do God is to kill Him, so they killed Jesus.

Now, understand that it does no good to assign blame either to the Jews or to the Gentile Romans for the death of Jesus. They are both guilty. Jesus knew this, too, but He didn’t assign blame to them, but instead asked God the Father to forgive both Jews and Gentiles, which is to say, all people. We all are guilty of the death of Jesus, but that is only fitting because Jesus died for us all so that everyone who trusts in Jesus to save them from sin and death has been forgiven and will live with Jesus forever.

We ought to be glad that God is humble. If God were not humble and merciful, but only a righteous, all-powerful God, then He would have to use His power to punish all sinners for their sins. No other god would humble himself like Jesus did, but then no false god has any answer for sin except to pile more requirements upon us to try harder to accomplish the impossible task of saving ourselves. Jesus was not ashamed to humble himself. Jesus had nothing to prove, but He had much to accomplish. Jesus dirtied His body and soul with our sin so that He could wash us clean and rescue us from death. This He accomplished, and for this we (humbly) worship and praise Christ Jesus our savior.

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Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11)

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For more on this topic see: The Sovereignty of God

Shepherd Visitors

The Shepherds worship Jesus

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.” When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told. (Luke 2:8-20)

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There is quite a history of shepherds in the Bible. Faithful Abel was a shepherd. Abraham kept flocks, as well as Isaac, Israel (Jacob), and Israel’s twelve sons. Perhaps the best known shepherd in the Bible is David. When the prophet Samuel went to Jesse’s house in Bethlehem to anoint his youngest son as God’s choice to be the next king of Israel, David was out in the fields tending the sheep.

Though David would become the most faithful and successful king in Israel’s history, he is equally well known as the author of Psalm 23:

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Jesus: The Good Shepherd

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

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It is neither an accident, nor a coincidence that Jesus was born in the same town as King David. God is perhaps the greatest poet in history, linking historical events, prophesy, and the historical fulfillment of prophesy together through Christ. Though the Holy Scriptures frequently use the metaphor of the people as the sheep and God as the shepherd, there is no passage in Scripture more memorable than Psalm 23. It shows us the proper attitude we all should have toward God that a great king such as David would consider himself a lowly lamb who dutifully follows where God leads as his shepherd. This also shows why David is considered a great king, despite his great wickedness and sins. All of David’s success came from God, and he remembered that his whole life.

Jesus: the Lamb of God

God had promised David that one of his descendants would be the long-awaited savior of the world. Jesus is the fulfillment of that long-awaited promise. Jesus is both the Good Shepherd, who cares for the sheep, and Jesus is the sacrificial lamb who endures the punishment for the sin of the world. God was with David throughout his whole life. From the time he was a lowly shepherd to when he was king of Israel, God cared for David as a shepherd cares for his sheep. And when David committed great wicked sins, God was there to rebuke David, but only to bring him to repentance so that David would know that all his sins were forgiven for the sake of the promised savior (Jesus). That is the kind of a God we have.

The shepherds who were near Bethlehem on the evening when Jesus was born surely knew God’s promises to send a savior. When they heard the message of the angel they hurried into town to see their savior in the flesh. The shepherds believed the Word of God from the angel though the baby Jesus was seemingly a helpless infant, and Mary and Joseph had to place Jesus in a manger because no one had sacrificed their own comfort to make the incarnate God more comfortable for his first night out of the Blessed Virgin’s womb. When the shepherds returned to their fields they praised God that He had kept His promises and had come to earth in our flesh to redeem us from our sins.

Don’t make me come down there!

From Emmanuel

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” --which means, “God with us.” (Matthew 1:18-23)

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A couple years ago there was a well-intentioned, but ultimately blasphemous billboard campaign which purported to be some kind of messages from God. They showed a black billboard with white lettering ending in the simple tag, “– God.” It was blasphemous because none of the pithy sayings had any direct reference to Holy Scripture, and they only contained Law and no Gospel, and they frequently contradicted clear teachings of God’s word. Nevertheless, they were sort of amusing in a superficial (though blasphemous) way. One of my favorites said, “Don’t make me come down there. – God” as if God were a parent warning His disobedient children with vain threats.

I don’t know what the billboard writers had in mind because they were a little late with their warning. The first people that God created (Adam and Eve) long ago let that cat out of the bag. Because Adam and Eve brought sin into the world God DID come down here. Fortunately, when God came down here He didn’t bring about the punishment the billboard sponsors were insinuating. When God came down here He didn’t come to judge and condemn us. Instead God came down to rescue and redeem us from our sinfulness.

This is the Gospel message. It is also one reason why our church is named Emmanuel and it is why the windows pictured with this essay are right up front and are a prominent visible feature to all who worship in our church.

The incarnation of God into man is the central event in all of human history. That is why we count our years from the date of Christ’s birth (or as close as could be determined at the time, but that is a story for another blog). God knew before He made people that we would rebel against Him and we would be lost unless He did something to save us. Yet, He went ahead and created the people who would reject His authority and cause Him immense grief and suffering. Why would anyone do that? Only love could cause someone to go through that kind of suffering rather than avoid it. “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:7-8)

All man-made gods require something from their followers to prove that they are worthy of favor. This makes these false gods seem very demanding, but it also makes them able to be manipulated by the actions of people. This is why false gods are so attractive to people. Though the false gods can be harsh taskmasters, they can also make it seem to the people as if they can control God. This is what people have been trying to do ever since Adam and Eve first disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden.

The true God is not like the false gods. Jesus didn’t come to us to demand anything from us. There is nothing we can give God that doesn’t already belong to Him. We can’t make up for our sinful rebelliousness. Jesus didn’t come to take anything from us. He came to give. Jesus came to live the obedient human life that none of us are capable of doing. Jesus did please God the Father with His obedient life, and then He offered His life in place of ours on the cross. Because of what Jesus did on the cross we are saved from our sins and all who trust in the forgiveness that Jesus won for us will be rescued from death and blessed with eternal life in paradise.

This brings up the one glaring omission in the “Emmanuel” set of windows in the front of our church. There is no cross depicted anywhere in this set of windows. The cross is central to what the church is all about because without Christ’s sacrifice on the cross nothing else would have any meaning at all. On nearly every other set of windows in the church there is at least one cross, and often many crosses are depicted, but not in these. There are plenty of crosses in the chancel of the church, but unfortunately not in the most prominent, and arguably, the most beautiful set of windows in the church. Well, nothing on this earth is perfect, except Jesus Christ. Even the best of these beautiful windows are only dim shadows of the beauty and the love of God that we will experience in God’s heavenly kingdom, but all the windows in our church guide us to look toward Christ for our salvation, and that is where true beauty is found.