Power, Status, and the Subversion of the Pagan Moral Order: How Jesus' Birth Changed Everything

It's said that familiarity breeds contempt. Although our familiarity with the Christmas story doesn't cause us to look down on it, it can blind us to just how shocking the Nativity was to many in the first century.

Just how radical it was becomes evident when we compare it to the nativity stories of paganism. Although Greco-Roman myths often had infants born of a god, even as babies they possessed superhuman powers. Take the story of Hercules, for instance. Hercules is born as a result of a liaison between Zeus and a human woman. Hera, the wife of Zeus, in her jealousy and spite, sends two serpents to kill Hercules as he lies sleeping in his cradle. His mother, working in the other room, is struck with a sudden fear that things are not right. Frantically rushing to the side of his crib, she peers into it only to find Hercules with a dead serpent in either fist—the infant has strangled each viper before it could strike.

In the Christian nativity story, in contrast, God sends His Son in the form of a baby—but not a baby imbued with superhuman strength, but a fully human baby, completely helpless and dependent on His parents. And God choses for Jesus’ earthly parents, not members of the aristocracy, but people from an obscure little town in Galilee.  And although He was the Lord of the universe and thus “came to His own” (John 1), Jesus came not as the Greek heroes came, to be served, but rather to live a life of service to others—a life   which culminated in that stunning act of supreme service: offering His life in our place upon the cross, suffering a form of death considered to be so degrading that it was reserved for the lowliest of criminals, and prohibited for Roman citizens. 

This idea of the Lord of the Universe, a King of Kings, who nevertheless was born of humble parents, lived a life of lowly service, took the form of a slave, and suffered death on our behalf, completely subverted the ideals upon which the Greco-Roman world was founded. As Ronald Osborne points out:

[As Christianity took hold], the highest models of heroism [became] no longer warriors who conquered and subjugated their rivals, but Christian martyrs—both men and women—often of lowly origin-who displayed a form of courage-in-weakness that was available to all. With the increasing penetration of the Roman state by believers, the rhetoric of leadership also changed. Members of the urban elite who aspired to high office were increasingly compelled to speak (whether sincerely or not) not of their own nobility, but of their great love for the poor. [And over time, a newfound concern for the marginalized began to elevate the status of women, children, and eventually, slaves.]*

And so, because of the birth of Jesus, gradually, a world that had believed that the distinguishing quality of the gods was power, came to believe that in fact, the distinguishing characteristic of God was love: that in fact, God was LOVE. The world’s never been the same since...