Our King is the one who put the world on notice. That babe in swaddling clothes announced to the nations you will either bow down and worship Him or be trampled underneath His glorious feet. The Son of Man, the Prince of Peace, entered brokenness and brought His Shalom. He went raiding behind enemy lines, rescuing His elect and delivering them safely back to God.

One of the most significant accomplishments in antiquity, in a history littered with wars and violence, was a hundred years of peace known as the Pax Romana, which in English means the peace of Rome. This unique and peculiar era of warless tranquility, which is unmatched in any other period known to man, saw no more nation rising up against nation, rumors of wars no longer on the lips of women in the market, and the myriad of complex personalities, usually unrestrained, now contained within a burgeoning peace, which lasted from 27BC, under the reign of Augustus, to the death of Nero Caesar in 68 AD. This is the world and setting that the Savior of the world was born.

On that first Christmas morning in Judea, God did not show up for a press conference at a palace or a “Precious Moments” commercial in the big city. Instead, in a surprise attack, He stormed the beaches of Bethlehem. He blitzkrieg’d the stables of that old country barn and assembled all the legions of heaven to herald Christ is Lord to shepherds in their fields. He held His fiery star in the sky to announce kings and kingdoms would either worship Him or be put down. While under the peace of Rome, God was bringing war.

And He was bringing war because this old world had fallen into bitter, soul-crushing slavery to an evil dragon. A serpent of great beguiling who tricked our only king into trading in his scepter for over-tight handcuffs… His crown for rusty chains. On that first Christmas morning, after legions of failed men who came before Him, the heaven-sent God-Man was born the royal Man-King. Delivered as a helpless babe to deliver and set the helpless free.

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