The Mysteries of the Rosary: The Third Joyful Mystery

This is part 3 of a 20 part series on the Mysteries of the Rosary. If you have not done so please read part 1 and part 2.

The 3rd Joyful Mystery: The Nativity of Jesus

“So all went to be enrolled, each to his own town. And Joseph too went up from Galilee from the town of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David that is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2: 3-6).

We first see that Jesus was born in Jerusalem, the City of David, with a restatement from chapter 1 of Joseph’s lineage. This emphasizes what we originally saw in the 1^st Joyful Mystery: that Jesus, as a result of being an adopted son of Joseph, will be not only within the house of David, but also a Son of David (Luke 1: 26-33) and will carry with Him all the prophetic implications that come along with such a title.

Yet despite these glorious and majestic implications, the passage turns toward something quite surprising. Rather than a monumental and lofty arrival on earth, as we might expect of the coming Messiah, our Lord and Savior reveals Himself in what appears to be an anticlimactic manner: ‘she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger’.

We are almost forced to ask: why so simplistic? Why not something bigger, something more becoming of a person of His stature and power? If He is who the Angel Gabriel and Elizabeth have proclaimed Him to be, why not have an incarnation that is more grand and splendorous?

There are answers to these questions that are revealed to us, such as Solomon also having been wrapped in swaddling clothes (Wisdom 7: 4-6), making Solomon a type of Jesus while solidifying the identification of Jesus as a son of David.

But it seems like the heart of such questions stems from a far bigger issue: whenever we, human beings, expect more from God than what we receive or perceive, it is usually based on faults we have in our own expectations. In the case of Jesus’ birth, His coming or arrival instills in us a ‘sensory’ expectation. The unconscious logic that follows from it may appear like this:

1. The Messiah is grand and splendorous

2. He will come to Earth in some way that we will experience with our senses (see Him, hear Him, etc.)

3. Therefore, the way we see, hear, or in any other way experience His existence when He comes, will be grand and splendorous

It appears to make sense at first, but anyone who has taken a class in logic knows that the conclusion that is derived here does not necessarily follow from the first two premises. To put it another way, God’s ways are not our ways.

In this case, we can see the error of this thought process if we take a step back and look at what is right in front of us. Yes, the Messiah is grand and splendorous, and so yes it does make sense for him to come among us in a grand and splendorous way. But does it follow that it will be a visually stunning spectacle of cinematic proportions?

Indeed, our sensory expectation ends up only distracting us from what is more grand and splendorous then any spectacle we could possibly imagine, let alone experience: that the Messiah has, in fact, arrived, he is an actual person here among us, and that this person among us is God Himself.

This miracle of God, who is Pure Existence and Divine in nature, in taking on a human nature, taking on our physicality, our sensory experience and all of the weaknesses that come along with it, is an incredibly common oversight among Christians. A Transcendent Being who created the Universe from nothing, who created life itself, who created human beings in His image and likeness, has chosen to become that very image and likeness. Can an author of a book truly, literally, fully become a character in his or her own book? Can an artist truly, literally, fully become part of the very painting that he or she creates?

“Why so simplistic? Why not something bigger, something more becoming of a person of His stature and power?” The answer is that there is nothing bigger, nothing more becoming of a person of His stature and power then to do what none would think of, to do what no one and nothing else could possibly do of their own volition: to take on a nature below one’s own. This truth, so illuminating because it puts into perspective everything that Jesus has come to do, yet so mysterious because we cannot comprehend its possibility and depth, is beyond anything we could ever have thought to experience.

Yet this is what God has done: truly, literally, fully.

Thus ends the 3^rd Joyful Mystery.