Undercover King

This morning when I woke up, I felt fresh, positive and grateful.

After I gave thanks to God for the things He has done for us, I started my daily reading as usual.

Today's gospel reading about the annunciation and the first reading is from Isaiah prophecy about how the King will come.

As I read through the passage, there's a burning question.

I asked God, in the past few weeks during this advent season, all the readings from old testament are about the prophecy of the King, the Messiah who would come to rescue the Israel and returned them back to the promised land.

The prophet portrayed the king like those in the previous kingdom for eg King David and His descendants who were with great power and wisdom. And Israel was hoping and waiting for this kind of King for long period of time since their exile period.

Yet, when Jesus, the truly King was born, He even didn't have the proper place during his arrival in this world. People rejected him by not giving the place for His mother and father. If people knew that Jesus will be the King, would they still reject Him ?

Why Jesus came in such a way that different from the prophet portrayed ? 

During the silent moment with "why" questions, suddenly God broke the silentness with a parable.

He told me, do you know the TV show "UNDERCOVER BOSS" ?

Imagine this scene, in the big company which is in chaos because there's no good CEO. The previous appointed CEO was changing frequently, the employees were in the lost direction, some are discouraged, some are even losing hope and some are still having slight hope for a better change in the company.

Then one day, there's announcement from the board of stakeholder that new appointed CEO will be coming soon to save this organization from the mess. Nobody knows who will be this CEO except the Board of Stakeholders.

People are starting to have high hope. They are wondering who will this CEO be, they imagine him as they way they want him to be.

Some have desires to have increased in salary, some have desires to have better welfare and some may not know what to expect as long as they found the fulfilment in their job, they are contented.

Then, the day has come, this new CEO comes on board in an unusual way. Instead of entering the main office with nice suit and sparkling shoes, he chooses to enter the back gate and go to the warehouse. He wears very simple tshirt like those worker and chooses to start working from the lowest position whom most people usually look down. 

He befriended with those people, humbly learning from them, listening to their problems and challenges attentively. Then he moves from one department to another department to know better about the people, how they work, the challenges.

More than often, he meets the higher position employee with the attitude as if they are the CEO. They love to instruct their subordinates, back stabbing their colleagues so that they could claim higher and wishing one day they would be the CEO.

After spending 6 months, he now understands about the people, the organization.  And finally the time has come that he reveals himself as the new appointed CEO. People are caught by surprise, they don't believe that he's the new CEO. It's totally different from the way they expect and imagine.

For those who have been working so well, he gave them their rewards, for those who have great attitude, he gave them higher responsibilities.

And for those who have bad attitude, he's kind enough to give them last chance to change themselves.

After this process, people in this organization respect him even more.

Because of his humility and his love, people are motivated to work together to make the organization becomes better place for everybody.

That's exactly why Jesus was born in that way.

God loves all of us so much, Jesus the appointed "CEO" chose to arrive not as the king with power whom people are fear of.  He wants to be the King who is able to be stay close enough with us. He wants to understand us, our feeling, the challenges we face everyday and be one of us. He wants us to have intimate relationship with Him.

During His undercover, people may reject, underestimate him but the time has come to reveal that He's the truly King, the King with love and mercy and He still wants to stay closer with us to journey this life together until the end of time. 

After encountering His love and mercy, we are expected to be His co-worker to make this world better place for every one.

This is the best Christmas wisdom I've ever received this year.