Contemplative Bible Reading

Matthew 1:18 (New Living Translation)

This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Here we are in late January. A month ago, you probably heard this (hi)story a time or two.

There are a few sentences in the Bible that stand alone in that if we lost much of the rest of the Bible, we would be fine with just the sentence or two. This is one of them.

There was the fellow from a small town. God anointed that fellow to take away the sins of everyone in all time so that we may all be able to enter God’s presence. God put the seed of that fellow into the body of a virgin so that she would bring him into the world for us.

I suppose we could consider the preceding paragraph for a lifetime or a hundred lifetimes. It makes no sense. I makes all sense. It is the basis for everything before and since.

Praise God from whom all blessing flow—Thomas Ken.