Are the old, familiar Christmas tales more meaningful than we realize?
Sometimes the most familiar stories are the ones we pay the least attention to.
We put up the same decorations, sing the same songs, and tell the same stories every December. We've heard about Mary and the angel so many times that we might miss how absolutely unprecedented—how truly impossible—these events were. And in all that familiarity, we can overlook the fact that these events fundamentally changed all of creation forever.
The world was one way. Then, after the events that Christmastime is meant to remember, it was a completely different way.
So instead of taking Christmas for granted this year—whether you're someone who loves this season or someone who finds it exhausting or painful—let's look at what Christmas really was: an impossible mission that required unprecedented faith.
When angels show up with impossible news
The story begins in Luke 1:26-33, where the angel Gabriel appears to a young woman named Mary in the town of Nazareth. Luke, who wrote this account, was a doctor—meticulous, thorough, and as close to a scientific perspective as we find in the ancient world. He's not writing fairy tales. He's documenting what actually happened.
But Luke makes some assumptions that you or people you know might not share. He assumes there's a spiritual reality beyond what we can see and touch—that angels are real entities. He assumes there's a relational, proactive Creator God who sends these angels with specific messages to specific people in specific places on earth. He assumes the people of Israel have a special relationship with this God.
If you're reading this and thinking, "I'm not sure I believe any of that," that's okay. It's worth knowing that the Christmas story is actually one chapter in a much larger story. There's a lot of background and context in other parts of Scripture that establishes these realities. The Christmas story is essential and world-changing, but it's not the whole story—it's one crucial chapter.
So what does the angel tell Mary?
"You have found favor with God. You will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end" (Luke 1:30-33).
Your mission: be blessed by God, have a baby, and that baby will be the king over all of Israel.
Mary's response? "How will this be, since I am a virgin?" (Luke 1:34).
It's a logical question. She's young, but she's old enough to know where babies come from. And she's saying, "I have not known a man. How is that going to work?"
The impossible becoming possible
The angel's answer is stunning: "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God" (Luke 1:35).
For a human baby to be conceived without sexual contact is impossible. For a baby to be born without any contribution of a human father is impossible. And this child won't be some half-god from mythology—he'll be both fully God and fully human, which is... well, impossible.
(Side note: If that is not impossible enough for you, consider the impossibility from another angle: What must it have been like for the infinite, almighty Creator of the universe—the one who spoke and all of physics came into being—to be confined to a single time and space, contained in a fragile bag made of flesh and blood? The primary spiritual force of ALL existence, contained in a single fetus?)
The angel adds almost as an aside: "Your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God" (Luke 1:36-37).
Nothing is impossible with God. He can overcome infertility when it's part of his mission. He can overcome virginity when it's part of his mission. God alone can do what cannot be done.
Although it might seem strange, it is comforting to know that if God has an impossible mission for you He will let you know. The message will be delivered. What might be frightening to realize is that He leaves it up to you to choose to accept it.
God briefs those he dispatches on his impossible mission.
Mary's response? "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word" (Luke 1:38).
A teenage girl looks an angel in the eye and says, "Whatever God has for me, I'll do."
God isn't playing games
Sometimes we think God is secretive, that he's playing some kind of game behind the curtain, trying to trick us or withhold something we need. But God is not secretive—even though he maintains mysteries. He's written an entire book about who he is, what he wants, and what he's doing in creation. You cannot write that much and be trying to keep yourself hidden.
So here's a question worth sitting with: What requests has God made of us that we actually consider impossible?
Maybe it's freedom from addiction. Maybe it's surrendering desires that feel core to who we are. Maybe it's loving an enemy—someone who hurt you deeply. Maybe it's forgiving when forgiveness feels like letting someone off the hook.
We hear what God asks and we think, "Impossible. It cannot be done” We tell God, “Don't mock me with your impossibilities!"
But how would our attitude toward God change if we considered that his requests were, in fact, possible? It's one thing to interact with someone you're pretty sure is lying to you. It's entirely different to realize they might be telling the truth—that you actually could do what they're asking.
The mission wasn't just for Mary
Mary said yes to God's impossible mission. But she wasn't the only one affected by her decision. She had a fiancé named Joseph, and her pregnancy was going to impact him too.
In Matthew 1:18-25, we get Joseph's side of the story. Mary is found to be pregnant, and Joseph—described as "a just man" with a reputation for integrity—decides to divorce her quietly. In their culture, engagements were legally binding and required a divorce to end. He knows that when he divorces her, she'll likely never be able to remarry. The list of men willing to marry someone perceived as an adulteress is very short.
So Joseph decides not to make a big deal of it. He'll end things quietly and not add public shame to what she's already facing.
Then he falls asleep, and an angel appears to him in a dream.
"Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins" (Matthew 1:20-21).
The angel starts with the fear: "Do not fear." Don't make your decision out of fear of what everyone will think. Don't be afraid of the shame. Don't be afraid of what this will cost you.
God has brought this child to Mary. And this boy's mission is bigger than your personal family legacy, Joseph.
As a father and husband taking a bride who's pregnant with a child that isn't his, the shame would be significant in their culture. And Joseph would have to raise a child he knew wasn't his own. The question of his legacy—what people would remember him for—was real.
The angel tells him to name the child Jesus (which means "salvation") because "he will save his people from their sins." Joseph doesn't even get to pick the name—another piece of fatherhood given over to God's mission.
The plan was in place before Joseph was born
The angel explains that "all this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 'Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel' (which means, God with us)" (Matthew 1:22-23).
The prophet mentioned here is Isaiah, who lived and wrote around 740 BC—700 years or so before Joseph was born. The mission was planned long before any of these people existed.
And here's what that mission has always been about: God's presence on earth among his people.
The pleasure of the garden of Eden wasn't the fruit or gold or rivers or trees—it was God walking with humanity in the cool of the day. When God delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt, the real treasure wasn't their freedom or even the promised land they'd call home—it was that the God of all creation was dwelling among them. Throughout the history of Israel, what gave them dignity and hope wasn't their status as a nation but the fact that they had the residence of God himself among them.
And when they turned away and God withdrew his presence, they slowly crumbled.
The name Immanuel—"God with us"—captures what Christmas is really about. Not just a baby in a manger, but the infinite Creator choosing to dwell with his creation. God with us.
Joseph wakes up and does exactly what the angel commanded. He takes Mary as his wife, doesn't consummate the marriage until after Jesus is born, and names the child according to God's prescription (Matthew 1:24-25).
But he had plenty of reasons not to. How do you know a dream was from God and not just indigestion? What will everyone think? What will this cost?
In what reasonable ways do we disobey God because we are afraid?
We can come up with all kinds of logical-sounding reasons to avoid what God asks. The angel saw straight to Joseph's heart and said, "Don't be scared." Don't be afraid of how people will look at you or her. Don't be afraid that your own family will send you to the back of the house instead of inviting you in.
The mission continues
These are beautiful stories about two people who lived over 2,000 years ago. But before we close the book and move on, consider this dispatch that applies to us today.
After Jesus' resurrection, his disciples asked him, "Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" (Acts 1:6). They were still thinking about earthly kingdoms and political power.
Jesus' response: "It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:7-8).
Notice that phrase: "when the Holy Spirit has come upon you." That's the same power that came upon Mary and made the impossible possible. That's what changed her life forever and opened up a world of possibilities she didn't have the courage to imagine the day before.
Jesus tells his followers—tells us—that when the Holy Spirit comes upon us, we receive power. Not power to build earthly kingdoms or gain respect from the world, but power to tell others who Jesus is and what he's about. In our hometowns, in the next neighborhood over, even to people on the internet—to the ends of the earth.
God briefs those he dispatches on his impossible mission. He wouldn't tell you if he wasn't sending you.
So what's your impossible mission?
Maybe it's surrendering something you've been gripping tightly—an addiction, a relationship, a dream, a hurt. Maybe it's loving someone who feels unlovable. Maybe it's having a difficult conversation you've been avoiding. Maybe it's introducing someone to Jesus when you're afraid of what they'll think.
Whatever impossible thing God has asked of you, know this: Nothing is impossible with God. If he's asking it, it's because it's part of his mission. And he doesn't send people out alone—he sends his Holy Spirit to give us power.
The same God who enabled a virgin to conceive, who gave an old woman a child, who convinced a just man to risk his reputation, who confined himself to human flesh—that God is still at work today, still dispatching people on impossible missions, still providing everything needed to accomplish them.
Fear not. Take courage. The mission is God's presence with us, in us, through us.
And like Mary said: "Let it be to me according to your word."
