Christmas is a busy time of year. It’s a time of baking cookies, hosting holiday parties, and singing all of your favorite Christmas carols. It’s a time of wrapping presents, drinking hot chocolate, and last-minute shopping for that one family member you didn’t know was coming into town. It’s a time of hanging lights, decorating trees, and watching classic films, like Home Alone, Christmas with the Kranks, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. For some, Christmastime is filled with joy and cheer. For others, Christmastime is filled with stress and exhaustion.
No matter what life stage or season we’re in, we all have busy schedules at the end of each year, and we all get to a point where it feels like there is so much to do and so little time to do it all in. But as we attempt to fit in all the festivities and events, we miss something. We forget that Christmas is about more than the gifts and the music and the décor. It’s a day when we are to celebrate the birth of a child. And not just any child, but the Son of God.
What is so special about this child? Why does this boy named Jesus deserve our focus, our reverence, our worship? We can discover the answers to these questions by consulting a roughly 2,700-year-old Jewish prophecy written by a man named Isaiah.
In his biblical book, the prophet Isaiah is writing to the people of Judah, and he writes extensively about the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Savior who was coming into the world. With the writings of the New Testament, we now know that this Messiah, this Savior is none other than Jesus Christ. And in the ninth chapter of this book, Isaiah describes what this Savior, this Jesus would be like-
“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Isaiah 9:6, ESV
Wonderful Counselor. Mighty God. Everlasting Father. Prince of Peace. These are the names and titles Jesus would be known as. But what exactly do they mean, and how did they manifest in Jesus’ life and ministry?
Wonderful Counselor
Jesus is our Wonderful Counselor. He is omniscient (all-knowing) and wise, understanding the thoughts and intentions of every human heart (Matthew 9:4) and always having the right thing to say, even when the religious elites of the day tried their best to trick Him (Matthew 22:15-22). He constantly taught his disciples how to live righteously, and He eventually gave them His Holy Spirit, the Helper who would continue to guide them and cause them to remember the teachings of Jesus (John 14:26).
And Jesus is not just any counselor or teacher. He’s a good one, a wonderful one. Unlike the religious elites, He did not just talk the talk, but He walked the walk, never falling into hypocrisy (Matthew 15:7-9). He taught and trained His followers to live as He lived: holy and without sin (Matthew 5:48, 16:24; John 13:15, 34).
Mighty God
Jesus is our Mighty God. He is omnipotent (all-powerful), and He can do the impossible (Matthew 19:26), like walking on water (John 6:16-21), turning water into wine (John 2:1-11), and feeding over 5,000 people with a few fish and loaves of bread (Matthew 14:15-21). He is a miracle-worker who heals the sick (Matthew 9:35), casts out demons (Luke 4:33-36), and raises the dead (Luke 7:12-16). He makes the lame walk (John 5:5-9) and the deaf speak (Mark 7:31-35) and the blind see (John 9:1-7). And His greatest miracle of all was when He resurrected to accomplish the seemingly impossible salvation of hopeless sinners (Romans 10:9).
All of these signs and wonders that Jesus did during His earthly ministry pointed to the fact that He was divine, that He was God incarnate. He was no mere man, no mere teacher, no mere prophet (Matthew 16:13-16). He is the great I Am (John 8:58) who created this world out of nothing (Colossians 1:16) and who sustains us as our Bread of Life (John 6:35) and Living Water (John 4:10).
Everlasting Father
Jesus is our Everlasting Father. Now, this is not saying that Jesus the Son of God is the same person as God the Father (that’s actually a heresy called modalism). Isaiah 9 is saying that how Jesus relates to us, His people, is similar to how a father relates to his child. He loves us (John 14:21), He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7), and He shows compassion towards us (Mark 6:34). He provides for us (Matthew 6:31-33), and protects us (John 17:12), and at times, He even disciplines us (Mark 16:14). Jesus is always there for us (Matthew 28:20).
And by always, I mean ALWAYS. Jesus will always be with us, in the highs and the lows, on the hills and in the valleys, because He is omnipresent (everywhere, all the time). He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end who has always existed and will exist forever into the future (Revelation 1:8). Since the beginning of time (John 1:1), Jesus has never changed, and this means we can always rely on Him (Hebrews 13:8).
Prince of Peace
Jesus is our Prince of Peace. The Jews expected their long-awaited Messiah to come as a King, but Jesus was not the kind of King they anticipated. They believed the Messiah would come charging in on a horse to overthrow their Roman oppressors and re-establish the kingdom of Israel. But Jesus came to the earth, not as a leader, but as a baby (Matthew 1:24-25). He rode into Jerusalem, not on a trusty steed, but on a lowly donkey (Matthew 21:6-11). Instead of starting a war, He provided peace (John 14:27). Instead of putting the people to work, He gave rest to the weary and heavy-laden (Matthew 11:28). And instead of setting up the physical kingdom of Israel, He brought with Him the spiritual kingdom of heaven (Matthew 4:17).
But one day, Jesus will come back to this earth. He will ride a horse, and He will have a sword. Jesus, our King of kings and Lord of lords, will lead angel armies to ultimately defeat both sin and death. He will throw the Enemy into the lake of fire, and He will judge the wicked for their unrepentant sin (Revelation 19:11-16). Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that this Jesus is Lord (Philippians 2:10), and we who believe will dwell in His house forever (Psalm 23:6).
Jesus. Our Wonderful Counselor. Our Mighty God. Our Everlasting Father. Our Prince of Peace. He is everything that Isaiah the prophet wrote about and more. He came to this earth 2,000 years ago as a babe, and He is coming again soon. This Christmas, may we keep our eyes on this Child who was born, this Son of God, this long-awaited Savior.
“Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore…” Isaiah 9:7
