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DECEMBER 30 25 I t's a long way from the cradle to the cross, from a nighttime sky over Bethlehem ablaze with God's glory and the praise of a heavenly host to the silence of a sunless, threatening sky over Golgotha. Or is it? The birth of Jesus and His death on the cross are inextricably bound together. One makes no sense without the other. Without the cross, Jesus' birth has no purpose; without the cradle, His death could not accomplish His purpose: atonement for the sins of the world. The apostle John makes the connection between the cradle and the cross in his majestic affirmation, "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). It's relatively easy to find Jesus' birth in John's elegant prose. "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us." And Luke makes it patently clear that at Jesus' birth, the glory of the Lord was present both visually and audibly. None of Jesus' disciples doubted His humanity. Yet they saw Him do things no one else had done, say things about God no one else had said, and commune with His Father in ways no one else could imagine. In all of that, they saw glimpses of God's glory. But where is the cross in John 1:14? "We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth." The ultimate expression of God's glory was the death and resurrection of Jesus. "Where the world's hatred for God comes to its ultimate expression, so also does God's love for the world." 1 That collision of the world's malice and God's compassion reveals His glory more vividly than anything else. Several years ago, a friend gave us an unusual Christmas tree ornament: a large iron spike intended to replicate the nails driven through Jesus' hands and feet on the cross. It's so heavy that we have to place it near the trunk of the tree rather than on the end of the branches where the other ornaments hang. Each Christmas morning, when we gather around the tree, we pass that spike around, each person taking a moment to reflect on Jesus' death on the cross. It brings a sense of purpose to our morning. You see, it's not that far from the cradle to the cross. Mark Young, PhD President 1. Craig Keener, e Gospel of John: A Commentary. Volume One, p. 411 "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth." —John 1:14 The Cradle and the Cross