The Air Force just announced its new bomber, the B-21, to great fanfare.

It took me back to one of my favorite Air Force memories.

It was July 1986 when I was part of a four-person crew that flew a brand-new bomber, the B-1B, in its first appearance in a civilian air show in Dayton. The headline the next day on the front page of the Dayton Daily News read, “B-1B steals show in first appearance at Dayton airport.” Another article called our entrance, at 600 mph, “show stopping.” Most of the “countless thousands” of people there that day had never seen a plane like the B-1B. For a day, the four of us were celebrities.

Think of the way a football team makes an entrance.

Think celebrity introductions.

Then think of the way God came to us.

The Prophet Isaiah said that the Messiah would come, but it would be like a shoot coming out of dead stump.

Unexpected.

Vulnerable.

The most subtle way imaginable.

Yet somehow, contained within that tiny shoot would be:

“The Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,

“The Spirit of counsel and of power,

“The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD…”

It was fun, all those years ago, to be a celebrity for a day.

But when God sent his Son into the world, he would have none of that.

And yet, within that shoot was the power to “fill the earth with the knowledge of the Lord.”