In a world of terrorism, racial tensions, immigration debates, the need for criminal justice reform, and a widening gap between the haves and the have-nots, the authentic Christ of the Bible is needed like never before. When Christ came into the world in human form, He came as a marginalized, oppressed immigrant, as well as the object of ethnic profiling (we would call this racial profiling today). He was born in an under-resourced and violent setting. According to His genealogy found in Matthew 1, He was born Jewish, Hebrew, African, Asiatic – a multi-ethnic human being. He was part of a people group living under the power structure of the Roman Empire.
When Christ was born, every male baby that looked like Him was murdered under the instruction of the governing authority. Terrorism was not a foreign concept for the earthly family of our Lord and Savior. The earthly family of Christ fled to Egypt in order to escape terrorism – making them undocumented refugees. Christ came in the human package of the vulnerable and despised so that He would have a deep and intimate credibility with the most marginalized and oppressed around him. Yes, He came that salvation might be a gift for all willing to repent, but the human shell He came in allowed Him to have a powerful connection with the diseased, outcast, left for dead, demonized, and poverty-stricken. What a scandalous way for God to enter our world. I believe God sent the Son into the world in this way on purpose. But we cannot truly understand the Kingdom-advancing ramifications of how Christ came into the world if we deny its importance.
The heavenly heritage of Christ in John 1 establishes Him as the Son of God, and Matthew 1 establishes Christ as the Son of Man. This take on Christology is important, because it takes Christ out of the racialized matrix that the dominant church in the United States has put Him in. We continue for the most part to portray Christ as White and European from birth to death on the cross to resurrection. This version of Christ is not only unbiblical, but also limits our evangelism, discipleship, and Kingdom advancement. The divinity and the multicultural human package of Christ matters and is deeply connected to the Spirit He sends, the Church He starts, and the Kingdom He establishes. When the Church grabs onto the true and revolutionary act of the incarnation, there’s a greater opportunity for reconciliation and transformation.
