Part of the wonder of Advent is meditating on the mystery of our God...or perhaps I should say, our mysterious God. As much as the systematic theologians want to smooth out all the wrinkles of Scripture and theology to present us a God who is tidy, neatly-packaged, and predictable, God will have nothing of it. In reality, if we're honest, Scripture is not so easily handled and God is not always so easily understood.

The whole revelation of the bible presents us with a God who makes a habit of acting quite differently than we might expect. God likes to choose the younger over the older, the unfortunate over the privileged, the poor over the wealthy, the unlearned over the scholar, the despised over the celebrity...again and again he does this. As Bonhoeffer points out:

God travels wonderful ways with human beings, but he does not comply with the views and opinions of people. God does not go the way that people want to prescribe for him; rather, his way is beyond all comprehension, free and self-determined beyond all proof.

Perhaps the ultimate theological curve ball God throws us is the incarnation, Christ's taking on of humanity, deity becoming humanity. As if this weren't enough of a theological problem, this whole business is compounded by God's decision to be born in an out of the way village, not the cultural center of the Mediterranean. He comes as a son born to an unwed mother and lowly carpenter, not as royalty or celebrity. He is born among sleeping livestock, not in a palatial or even well-decorated nursery. God calls attention to this most incredible miracle by announcing it to shepherds, not to theologians or mega-church pastors or best-selling authors.

In other words, in the eyes of the world (and maybe quite a few of his own people) God gets it all wrong...again. Yet in actuality, in his own mysterious way, God of course gets everything exactly right. In Eugene Peterson's words:

The wonder [of Christmas] keeps us open-eyed, expectant, alive to life that is always more than we can account for, that always exceeds our calculations, that is always beyond anything we can make.

Keep the wonder alive. Look for the unexpected. Revel in the mystery and glory of God.