by Colt Howell
As Advent draws near again, these quiet weeks in which the Church slows her pace and leans forward toward Christmas, we return to a story so familiar that we risk forgetting how astonishing it really is. If anything, Advent is a gracious invitation to wake up again, to feel the weight of wonder we’ve grown too accustomed to.
Because the most electrifying miracle in all of history begins with something that looks entirely ordinary.
It isn’t too uncommon of a thing for a baby to become a king. In fact, every king was a baby once. Royal nurseries have held infants destined for thrones from the very beginning. Kings rise by birthright; they ascend by inheritance; they mature into their reigns. The story of a baby growing up to be king is so familiar that we don’t even pause to consider it. It’s predictable. Expected. Almost mundane.
But over two thousand years ago, something happened in Bethlehem that had never happened before and has never been repeated since. Something so wild, so universe-tilting, that it ought to make the world stop mid-sentence.
Because this is not the story of a baby who became a king.
This is the story of a King who became a baby.
What Advent Actually Means
Before we go any further, it’s worth pausing to remember what Advent actually is.
The word “Advent” comes from the Latin adventus, meaning “arrival,” “coming,” or “appearing.” In the ancient world it was used when a king or emperor visited a city. Trumpets would sound. Roads would be cleared. Decorations hung. Messengers sent ahead. An advent was a royal arrival, an eruption of glory into ordinary life.
For Christians, Advent refers to two arrivals at once:
- The First Advent: when the eternal Son of God took on flesh and was born in Bethlehem.
- The Second Advent: when Christ the King will return in power and glory to judge the living and the dead.
And so Advent is a season of waiting, preparing, and longing. Not just for Christmas morning, but for the great and final morning when the King returns and makes all things new. It is a season of holy tension: we look back to the manger with joy, and we look forward to His coming with hope.
In short, Advent teaches us to live in the beautiful ache of expectation.
And the only reason we can expect His return is because of His first arrival: the miracle of the King who became a child.
The King Who Came Down
Something utterly different happened that night in Bethlehem. Heaven bent low. Infinity took on a beginning. The One who spoke galaxies into existence inhaled His first breath of Judean air.
The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). The Ancient of Days became an infant of days. The Creator became a creature. This should rattle us. This should stun us all over again.
Because this King so deeply identifies with His people that He entered the world just as we do: born of woman, wrapped in weakness, dependent on others for care and protection. In order to stand as the representative of ruined sinners, He would have to be like us in every way: fully human. And yet, to save us, He would have to be utterly unlike us: perfectly righteous, eternally divine.
The baby in the manger was no future king growing into his coronation. He was already the reigning King, stooping down into human flesh. The divine coming King. The promised Messiah. The Suffering Servant. The anointed Conqueror. The radiance of the glory of God (Heb. 1:3). The image of the invisible God (Col. 1:15). The Creator of the universe, now wrapped in cloths and laid in a manger.
He wore the badge of heavenly royalty, yet He wore the simplicity of poverty. He held the cosmos together by the word of His power, yet He needed to be held. He was worthy of eternal praises from seraphim and saints, yet the soundtrack of His first night was the bleating of sheep and the footsteps of shepherds.
And He did not come merely to be admired, but to be crushed. As the prophet had written centuries earlier:
“Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.”
(Isaiah 53:4–5)
Even at His birth, the shadow of the cross stretched over the manger.
The King Who Became Like Us, Yet Not Like Us
The miracle of Advent is not simply that Christ came, but that He came this way. Not in splendor, but in obscurity. Not in royal robes, but in swaddling cloths. Not with armies, but with angels singing to shepherds on the night shift.
He came low because we were low. He came weak because we were weak. He came human because only a true human could stand in the place of humans. Yet He remained fully God, because only God could bear the weight of divine wrath and rise again.
This King exhausted the wrath of God that our sins had stored up. He entered our world of tears so He could one day wipe them all away. He tasted suffering so deeply that no sorrow can now be foreign to Him.
Every earthly king ascends; this King descended. Every earthly king demands loyalty; this King offers Himself. Every earthly king clings to his throne; this King walked willingly to a cross.
He is like us, truly human, and yet utterly different. He is our spotless Lamb and sovereign Lord.
Advent Calls Us to Prepare Him Room
So as Advent begins, let us not let nostalgia or sentimentality rob us of the magnitude of what happened in Bethlehem. The King Himself stepped into our darkness, our dust, our fragility, our grief. And He will come again. Advent is the season where we learn to hold both truths with trembling joy:
He has come. And He will come again.
Let us be a people who slow down long enough to marvel. Let us be a people who prepare room in our hearts, our homes, our habits. Let us be a people who see the manger and remember the cross, and see the cross and remember the empty tomb, and see the empty tomb and remember the promise:
“Surely I am coming soon.” (Rev. 22:20)
So let the Church lift her eyes. Let the weary world rejoice. Let us adore the King who became a baby so that sinners might become sons and daughters of God.
Soli Deo Gloria.