When people ask questions about the birth of Jesus they usually ask "when, where, and how" about his conception and birth, but rarely will they ask "why." Specifically, why was Jesus born? God could have worked the Divine Will by some means other than being born a human being. God could have reached across the gulf of our sins and made things right without anyone having to die. God could have wiped out our sins, converted us into perfect, obedient children, and placed us all in paradise. God didn't have to come as Jesus of Nazareth to die in our place ... right?

                                                                                                              

While it is true that God could have achieved our redemption by some other means, God nevertheless saved us through personal presence and sacrifice:

God's very presence is essential to our salvation. This is, without a doubt, one of the most amazing elements in the entire Jesus-story. Another amazing element to the story is that God actually desires our response of love and faith. Sending an angel to give us a message of how to live, while wiping out our sin without any response on our part, might have worked, but it would have violated God's word. Throughout scripture, and most especially revealed in God's willingness to continually strive with the Israelites even despite their idolatry and disobedience, it is clear that God desires children who will respond with love and trust. We failed to trust God in the Garden of Eden, where we listened to and accepted the word of the serpent rather than God's Word. And, so, Jesus was born to give us the opportunity and ability to love and trust God.

Jesus' name - in Hebrew, Yeshua - means "Yahweh Saves" or "Yahweh Delivers." This is precisely what God planned to do through the incarnation, birth, life, death, and resurrection of our Lord. And, as was said through the prophet Isaiah, God's presence saves us.

Jesus places his faith in God the Father, trusting that God would honor God's word and, after the crucifixion, would raise him from the dead. Such faith acts as a confirmation and empowerment of our faith as Christians. We are enabled to have faith because of Jesus' own faith.

Jesus was born to proclaim the very essence of God as the one who saves us. Jesus was born to empower our faith by placing his faith in God the Father. Jesus was born to die for us and, hence, stand with and for us before the Father as our righteous savior. God comes, in Jesus of Nazareth, to be our savior and to enable and empower our faith. No angel, no messenger, no unrelated entity could have ever done this. To accomplish these purposes, God needed to become one of us - God had to become human - so that God could die. In other words, Jesus was born to live and to die as one of us and for every one of us.