Before the Face of the Lord

"Now his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit,
and prophesied, saying:
'Blessed is the Lord God of Israel,
for He has visited and redeemed His people, 
and has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of His servant David...
That we should be saved from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us,
to perform the mercy promised to our fathers
and to remember His holy covenant,
the oath which He swore to our father Abraham:
to grant us that we,
being delivered from the hand of our enemies,
might serve Him without fear,
in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest;
for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways,
to give knowledge of salvation to His people
by the remission of their sins,
through the tender mercy of our God,
with which the Dayspring from on high has visited us;
to give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.'"
~ From Luke 1

Personally, I love to read the prophecies spoken of His work,
of the Father's heart of mercy
and peace
and salvation
and love
and reconciliation
and good will toward men.
Oh, how it moves me.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.
And we mark our history by it.
All  the fullness of the Godhead bodily dwelling in Him.

How?!
How could He contain His glory in a dirt-body?
To be ministered to by sinners?
To be the visible show of God's requirements fulfilled,
the voice of His love to us,
the touch of the Father to the poor.
To the sinner.
To the leper.
To the lame and blind and to the women.
To the 'racially impure' Samaritans.
A friend to fishermen.
To tax collectors and zealots.
The political radicals and the cautious theologians.
The ruined whores of society.
He restored them all.
He put His calloused hands on the contagious outcasts,
and He stretched them out Himself on the cross.