Sermon Cloud

The king cake contains a hidden baby. If you happen to get the baby, you are responsible to throw the next party.

Baby Jesus became a political refugee at birth, the son of a peasant woman, pregnant out of wedlock, and powerless even to secure in Bethlehem a room made for human habitation.

Like millions of people in our own day, the family of Jesus fled their homeland threatened by a hostile and violent political leader. They went to Egypt seeking asylum. My first cousin, Allan, adopted two African children who survived ethnic cleansing in their country of origin only through a late-night escape orchestrated by a missionary at their orphanage.
Jesus and his family made it to Egypt and stayed there until King Herod died. Joseph was afraid to return to Bethlehem, however, because a relative of Herod reigned there. So the family veered north in their return and settled in a little town in Galilee called Nazareth.

One songwriter called Jesus "this stranger from Galilee." He was a king from the beginning. But his royal connections were kept under wraps because he had a job to do before they killed him. He was challenged repeatedly by well-meaning followers to assert his true authority, but he replied, "My time has not yet come."

What does it mean when the Creator God sends his emissary to this world and the population here can find no room for him? Born in a stable, sleeping outdoors, buried in a borrowed tomb-if the King of the Universe lives and dies like this on his visit to Planet Earth, what does that mean for we who seek to follow him?