“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.” – Micah 5:2

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 30, 2016): Micah 5

“I am what I was. I was not what I am. Now I am both.” It is an old Latin riddle, a riddle that was born out of the days when Christians and the church were trying to figure out their theology. This is a place where the Sunday School answer actually works (because in Sunday School the answer to every question is Jesus.) It speaks of difficult to understand comments like pre-existence and incarnation. With Jesus as the answer, the questions of the riddle are easily solved.

I am what I was – God. As Christians, we do not believe that we serve the creation of our God. Jesus is God, I recently read an assertion the Bible never actually states that Jesus was God, but I am not sure how they arrived at that conclusion. Even Jesus admitted it before his Jewish critics. “Very truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I Am” (John 8:58)! The Jews did not miss the assertion. “I Am” is the sacred name of God. The words of Jesus were severe enough that the Jews began to pick up stones in an effort to execute him on the spot for having the audacity of saying that he was God.

I was not what I am – human. It is the beauty that we celebrate every year at this time. The Incarnation – God became human. He wasn’t always like us, but at his choice he dressed himself with our flesh and became like us.

Now I am both – God and human. He retains this humanness that he took on himself in his being. He understands us as we struggle through this life because he became like us. He took on our flesh, and now his humanness mediates for us. Jesus did not throw away his humanity at his death and resurrection. The importance of the resurrection is more that he was willing to carry his humanity into eternity than it was about his defeating of death.

This prophecy of Micah alludes to the first part of the riddle. The one who was to come was of ancient origins. The use of the name Bethlehem Ephrathah probably goes beyond just differentiating between the two Bethlehems. Ephrathah was likely the name of the village before it became Bethlehem. The symbolism is that the Messiah, while he would be of the line of David of Bethlehem, his roots would extend much further back than that.

He was God. He had always been God. And in Bethlehem, God would begin his journey to save us.  

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Micah 6