Here is a man who was born in an obscure village,
the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another
village. He worked in a carpenter's shop until
he was 30. He never wrote a book. He never held
an office. He never owned a home. He never had
a family. He never went to college. He never
put his feet inside a big city. He never traveled
200 miles from the place where he was born. He
never did one of the things that usually accompanies
greatness. He had no credentials but himself.
while still a young man the tide of private opinion
turned against him his friends ran away one of
them denied him he was turned over to his enemies
he went through the mockery of a trial he was
nailed to a cross between two thieves gambled
for the only piece of property that he had on
earth while he was dying, and that was his coat.
When he was dead, he was taken down and laid
in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.
Nineteen wide centuries have come and gone, and
today He is the centerpiece of the human race.
I am far within the mark when I say that all
the armies that ever marched and all the navies
that were ever built and all the parliaments
that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned
put together have not affected the life of man
upon this earth, as has that one solitary life,
the life of Jesus Christ. And the Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. The hardest proposition
the infidel crowd has ever gotten up against
is to account for the person of Jesus Christ.
Isaiah said, His name shall be called Wonderful.
And there's no better name to describe him. He...
is the world's one great wonder. No one else
ever approached him. No one else is comparable
to him. He's in a class all by himself. He has
no second. No man ever uttered such wonderful
teaching. It was so simple. The common people
heard him gladly, and yet so profound that no
philosopher has ever sounded their depths. He
never wrote a sermon. He never published a book.
He founded no college to perpetuate his doctrines,
but handed them down to a few poor humble fishermen
and yet his teaching has endured for two thousand
years it has been translated into every language
under the sky it has so transformed human life
that whole nations have been lifted out of darkness
degradation by its power. Think of it. Think
of it. The teachings of Jesus Christ has endured
for 2 ,000 years, has so transformed lives. Human
life, their whole nations have been lifted out
of darkness by its power. And before this humble
Galilean peasant, the scholarship of the world
uncovers its head today. Bows its head and says,
never man speak as. This man spake. No man ever
lived such a wonderful life. And he backed up
what he said by the way he lived. He was there
with the goods. He never had to ask God to forgive
his sins because his character was perfect. His
enemies watched him like a hawk. And the very
worst... thing that they could say about him
was that he did good on the Sabbath and that
he let a sinful woman come near enough to him
to touch the hem of his garment. That was the
very worst thing that his enemies could say about
him. And then, There never was a character so
wonderful as his. He was born, of course, in
a given race and in a given age. He had to be.
But he utterly transcended his age and his race
and became the ideal of every age. The ideal
of every race. Come now, Mr. Infidel. Come now,
unbeliever. Come, Mr. Skeptic. How are you going
to account for Jesus Christ? If he was only man,
then by every law of evolution and progress,
this 20th century ought to produce a better one.
Intellectually and morally, this is so. Somebody
says, give us a man's race, his surroundings,
and the man himself is accounted for. This is
largely so. Socrates is of Greece, belonged to
his age. Luther is of Germany, and the circumstances
of his day had much to do with his heroic life.
And so, to a large extent, we can account for
them all. Napoleon, Buddha, Confucius, Cromwell.
But this is not altogether so. One day the tourist...
came to the birthplace of robert burns and as
he looked out over the charm of the highland
scenery and saw the quaint and quiet beauty of
it all he exclaimed audibly ah no wonder burns
was a poet but the guide at his side said sir
There have been many, many children born here
since Robert Burns was born, but none of them
was a poet. No more can you account for Jesus
Christ by his environment or the times in which
he lived. Other children were born. reared under
the Syrian skies and among the Judean hills.
Other young men had the same surroundings. Other
young men grew up among the same influences,
the same institutions, the same religious ideals,
the same personalities, the same conflict of
opinions, and all the rest of it. How... then
does it come that Jesus alone among them all
became the wonderful man that we see him to be.
The God -man of the universe who walked like
a giant among the pygmies of the earth. A truth
for this man, Mr. Infidel. Mr. Unbeliever, account
for this man. Come on. What have you got to say?
He is the one great mystery of the universe,
and the only clue to his origin you will ever
find, you'll have to find in the gospel where
it says, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee,
and the power of the Highest shall overshadow
thee, and therefore that holy thing which shall
be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
Jesus Christ himself said, what if ye shall see
the son of man ascend up where he was before
that shows his claim to pre -existence and shows
us where he was before he came to this earth
he sat one day looking up father Glorify me with
the glory I had with thee before the world was.
In these mattress, all -powerful, all -significant
words, Jesus shows his claim to preexistence
even before he came. to this earth even before
the world was spoken into existence. And now
comes the text in John. And the word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. Of course, there's
always been a set of critics who've had their
knife out for this duck. of the virgin birth.
I am well aware of this. So are you. And this
has been going on for generations. In Christ's
own day, they said, why, this is the carpenter's
son. We know him. We're some of his neighbors.
They couldn't... possibly be anything unusual
about him? We know his mother. He's just the
son of a carpenter. And that criticism of his
divine origin has never let up. Never. In 1892
over in Germany, it broke out anew, and we've
had a pretty warm fight on our hands. Ever since,
a preacher over there started it. He wouldn't
use the Apostles' Creed in baptism because it
said that Jesus was conceived of the Holy Ghost
and born of the Virgin Mary. They gave him his
walking papers, deposed him from the ministry.
And there's many a man who stands behind the
sacred desk today. Who denies the deity and divinity
of Jesus Christ as the very son of the living
God. Let me ask you, sir. How are you going to
account? for several things that are so reasonable.
The first thing you say is that nothing is said
about it by Mark or John or Paul. But that simply
begs the question. Because they said nothing
about it is no sign that they didn't know about
it or didn't believe it. They had other purposes
in writing. Mark began with his public ministry,
passed in silence over the first 30 years of
his life. Don't you suppose he knew he had a
birth of some kind that he never said a word
about it? John knew it because he had Matthew's
and Luke's Gospels with him. And when he wrote,
he wrote. with a definite purpose knowing that
the one of whom he wrote knowing the miracles
that had been performed were performed by one
that was not merely man but as much God as though
he were not man Luke was with Paul and of course
told all about it. But it's not to be expected
that Paul would mention it. The whole theme of
his ministry was the moral significance of Christ
as based upon his public ministry, his life,
his death, his resurrection. Well, all you can
say is the thing was impossible. What was impossible?
Such a birth itself. Not with God, my friend.
Let God step in on the scene and impossibility
must go away. Back and sit down. With God, nothing
is impossible. Because you can't understand it.
is no sign it is not true. There are lots of
things you can't understand, and yet you must
acknowledge that you believe them or acknowledge
that you're a fool. You say it's unthinkable.
What is unthinkable? The alleged result of such
a birth. What do you mean? You say, The union
of a divine and human nature in one person. It's
incredible. It can't be. Well, now, let's see.
Because that's exactly what the incarnation is.
The union of two natures in one person. A combination
of the divine and human in Jesus Christ. One
person. Well, if you do a bit of real hard thinking,
it may not be as unthinkable as you think it
is. But if it's unthinkable to the best human
thinker that operates, that's still no sign that
it's untrue. Can you understand the mechanical
union of oxygen and nitrogen that makes air?
Or of hydrogen and oxygen that makes water? Or
the union of body and soul that makes yourself?
You are a person. And if you can't understand...
This simpler union don't growl about divinity
and humanity uniting into one person. It's no
more incompatible than the union of matter and
spirit that makes one person out of... Acknowledge
God and you have the answer. And the Word was
made flesh and dwelt among us. And today, that
life has greater influence than any life that
has ever lived.