God Was With Us...
Isaiah 9:6 - For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Micah 5:2 - But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.
Matthew 1:18-23 - Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “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.” 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).
- ...to be my SUBSTITUTE . (Hebrews 2:9-10)
- ...to be my SANCTIFIER . (Hebrews 2:11-13)
- ...to be my SYMPATHIZER . (Hebrews 2:17-18)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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It was March of 1995.
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It was right around the time that I came to Christ.
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And I think that's why this particular song caught my attention.
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How many people remember this one-hit wonder from Joan Osborne called "One of Us"?
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How many people remember that song?
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"What if God was one of us?" Do you know that song?
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I was going to sing it for you, and my wife has been begging me not to.
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But Joan Osborne didn't write this song, she just performed it.
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It was written by a guy named Eric Bazilian.
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The lyrics go like this.
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Now this isn't, by the way, this isn't a Christian song, okay?
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This didn't come out of a hymnal.
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If you know the song, this reminds you of the lyrics.
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What if God was one of us?
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The song goes, "If God had a name, what would it be?
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And would you call to His face?
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If you were faced with Him in all His glory, what would you ask if you had just one question?" Then there's a refrain that says, "Yeah, God is great.
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Yeah, yeah, God is good.
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Yeah.
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What if God was one of us?
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Just a slob like one of us.
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Just a stranger on the bus trying to make his way home.
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Then the next verse says, "If God had a face, what would it look like?
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And would you want to see if seeing meant that you had to believe in things like heaven and Jesus and the saints and all the prophets?" And when that song came out, it was met with a reception of, man that's that is really deep you know like like could you imagine like what what would it be like if God was like actually if I God was like a man like what would that be like could you imagine like what would it what would it mean to us if like God was actually a person and and he like lived here and that's really an interesting food for thought if it didn't actually happen.
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Because the Bible answers all of these questions with the most simple and profound and amazing thing that's ever happened in the history of planet Earth.
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This simple truth.
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God was one of us.
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And this idea of God coming to be a part of His creation.
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Coming to the earth as a man.
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Understand that it wasn't an afterthought.
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It wasn't like God was in heaven looking down and pacing, thinking what am I going to do?
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How am I going to teach these people about me and what I'm like and the grace and the truth?
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How am I going to - oh, I've got an idea.
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I'll just become a man.
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It wasn't an afterthought.
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It was the plan from the very beginning.
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Testament is filled with prophecies. Here's a couple. Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 6. A familiar passage. "For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor." Look at this next phrase. "His name shall be called" what?
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"Mighty God." So this Messiah is going to be called Mighty God. He's also going to to be called Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
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So very clearly, the prophecy says the Messiah is going to be God.
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Micah 5:2 Another popular passage that's read at Christmas.
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"But you, Bethlehem, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel." But look at these last two phrases.
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Coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.
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See, that's not something that can be fulfilled by just some guy.
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Talking about a Messiah who is from ancient times.
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From of old.
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That can only describe God Himself.
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This was perfectly fulfilled in the New Testament.
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Matthew 1.
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Can we get that up there?
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The birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.
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When His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.
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And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.
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But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "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.
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She will bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus.
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For He will save His people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet.
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"Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel," God with us. That's a prophecy that comes from Isaiah chapter 7 and verse 14.
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But we're going to look today, I want you to turn in your Bibles with me to Hebrews chapter 2. We're going to look at just a few verses. It's going to sort of answer the question that was posed in this song. What if God was one of us? The Bible is very clear about who He is and the reason that He came.
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And I want to give you Words of encouragement.
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On your outline, God was one of us.
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And God was with us.
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Emmanuel.
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We're going to look at three reasons that He came.
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Three reasons that God became a man.
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And the first one is this - write this down.
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God was with us to be my substitute.
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God was with us to be my substitute.
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The Hebrew writer in commenting the ministry of Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, says, "But we see Him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God, He might taste death for everyone.
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For it was fitting that He, for whom and by whom all things exist bringing many sons to glory should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. So God was with us first of all to be my substitute. Notice in this passage here at the end of verse 9 it says that he might taste death for everyone. You see God cannot die. So the only way that God God could taste death was to take on human flesh.
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Well, why would He want to taste death?
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Well, the Bible tells us that the wages of sin is death.
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Death is the penalty for sin.
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And somebody might say, well, wait a minute, we're all going to die.
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Does that mean that we all are under the penalty of sin no matter what?
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I understand when you go back to the Garden of Eden, God told Adam that if you eat off the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you will surely die.
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But if you understand the original Hebrew, the phrase is literally this.
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He says, "Dying, you will die." Meaning, if you eat off of this tree, if you rebel, if you sin, it's going to start a process that's going to end with something.
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Dying you will die. That's why church, that's why we are getting old and wearing out.
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You know when I was in high school, I played soccer. I remember watching videos. I used to be able to run. I was fast.
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That was a long time ago.
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I try to run now and it's embarrassing. It is really embarrassing.
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You know if somebody was chasing me my best bet is to find a hill and roll down the hill What happened to me I was I was young and good-looking and in shape And I look in the mirror now and I'm like what happened. I'll tell you what happened. I'm getting old. I'm wearing out and Spoiler alert, so are you?
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Why is that?
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because wearing out, dying, we will die.
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And see, when we think of death, we immediately think of casket death.
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We think of the funeral home.
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But death literally means separation.
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It's the spirit being separated from the body, and with sin, we are separated from God.
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Death is the penalty for sin.
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And it was a man, Adam, the first man, that the Bible says, Romans chapter 5, "He brought sin and death and separation into the world." But you see, it was the second Adam, Jesus Christ.
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The Bible calls him the second Adam.
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He brought forgiveness and life and reconciliation with God.
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In other words, man brought sin into the world, so man needed to pay the penalty for sin.
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The problem is none of us are qualified to do that.
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Even if I said, even if I had this moment of nobility and eye of the tiger and martyr mentality, even if I had this thought, "You know what God? I will die for the sins of the world. You can kill me." I'm not qualified to do that. Because by nature, I'm guilty of sin myself. So if I were to die, I'd just be paying the penalty for my own sin. You You see, it would have to be a sinless man.
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But the only one who is sinless is God.
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And that's why we see unfolding God's perfect plan from long ago, from the very beginning, God's plan was to become a man.
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Jesus Christ, God in the flesh.
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Jesus wasn't half man and half God.
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Jesus, 100% man and 100% God at the same time.
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God's perfect man and man's perfect God.
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That's why this time of year, sometimes these magazines and newspaper articles will-- revisit the virgin birth.
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And by the way, there's this whole movement-- the statistics are sickening-- of churches and pastors that are denying the virgin birth.
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That say, "Yeah, the virgin birth isn't that important." I have no problem with the virgin birth.
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You know why?
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Because if Jesus Christ wasn't fully God and fully human in the manger, He wasn't fully God and fully human on the cross.
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He has to be both, as the Bible says He is.
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So God was with us, first of all, to be my substitute.
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Is He your substitute?
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Is Jesus Christ your substitute?
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You have two options when it comes to dealing with your sin.
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Your one option is you can face God yourself and deal with the consequences.
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Face God's wrath for your own sin.
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You have that option.
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I wouldn't recommend it.
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But you see, the other option is that you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, believing that He tasted death for you.
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That's really where it has to go.
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Is taking it from this story of yes, Jesus Christ - God in the flesh was born and He came to die.
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It's making it personal to say God took on flesh, He was born, and He came to die for me.
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You have to make that bridge where it goes from a count in history something God did for you personally.
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First of all, God was with us to be my substitute.
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Secondly, God was with us to be my sanctifier.
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To be my sanctifier.
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Look at verses 11-13.
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It says, "For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source.
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That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, 'I will tell of your name Brothers, in the midst of the congregation, I will sing your praise.
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And again, I will put my trust in Him.
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And again, behold, I and the children God has given me.
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So not only did God become a man to be my substitute, but God became a man to be my sanctifier.
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This is the glorious truth of the Gospel, that Jesus Christ didn't just come to erase your sin.
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That's only half the Gospel.
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This idea that Jesus died so that my sins are forgiven, that's half the Gospel.
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The other half of the Gospel is Jesus rose from the dead to give me eternal life.
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But not just eternal life.
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To me, this is the most profound doctrine in the entire Bible.
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And that is this, the Bible says that because of the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, when I receive Him by faith and you receive Him by faith, God sees you as righteous as Jesus Christ Himself.
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That's the most profound thing in the whole Bible to me.
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You know, we can talk about creation and virgin birth and Trinity, and we can talk about all of those things.
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I get that.
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But the thing that blows my mind more than anything else that Scripture teaches is that Jesus Christ not only forgives me of my sin, but He pronounces me as being as holy as Himself.
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And it's not because of what I've done.
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It's because of what He's done for me.
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That's called imputed righteousness.
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He puts His righteousness on my spiritual accounts.
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2 Corinthians 5:21 - it's my favorite verse in the Bible - that God took Jesus who knew no sin to become sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God.
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That verse says that in Christ, we become the righteousness of God.
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And that's what the Hebrew writer is talking about here when he says, "For he who sanctifies..." sanctifies means He makes holy.
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God demands that we are holy.
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Did you know that?
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He demands it.
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God doesn't have a loose policy on holiness.
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He demands that we're holy.
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We don't have it, so the good news is God gives it to us, right?
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That's grace.
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God giving to us what He requires from us.
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He gives us His holiness.
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I'm going to tell you, I've read this a billion times.
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And this truth just really gripped me in a special way this week.
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The truth in verse 11.
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It says He sanctifies - look at the last phrase in verse 11.
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It says, "That is why He is not ashamed to call them brothers." God, when you receive Christ as your Lord and Savior, when you're born again, He is not ashamed of us.
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I want you to think about that.
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You know, one of the things I love to do when we have people visit our church, I like to call them and I say, "Tell me about your experience." I like to get to know them a little bit with a brief phone chat.
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One of the questions I get asked often, "That worship leader, is he your brother?
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Because you guys really look alike." Well, when worship goes really well that Sunday, I say, "Yeah, he's my brother." Let's say we have a Sunday where worship doesn't really go so well.
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They're like, "Is that your brother, the worship leader?" You know what, I just met him last week.
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Barely know the guy.
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And if you've been here more than a couple weeks, you realize that problems with worship aren't typical.
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But I imagine the conversation might go the other way.
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When the sermon goes well, Darren's like, "Yeah, that's my brother." And when the sermon tanks, you see the point, right?
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Here's the truth that really gripped me.
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I want you to listen to this very closely.
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Somebody here needs to hear this.
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Jesus Christ calls us His brothers and sisters.
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Brethren, you get that, right?
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Jesus Christ calls us His brothers and is not ashamed of it.
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Sometimes, honestly, sometimes I think Sometimes I think maybe He should be ashamed of me.
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Sometimes I think maybe He should be.
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But your Bible tells you that He never is.
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He never is.
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I was thinking about that this week.
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You know, sometimes we're ashamed to call Jesus ours.
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Can somebody explain that to me?
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Can somebody explain to me what it is about Jesus you might be ashamed of?
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Has Jesus done something that might embarrass you?
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When I study his life and his ministry, why would we be ashamed of being associated with Jesus?
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But so often we are.
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We don't want to be looked at as the religious person.
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Sometimes we're ashamed to call Jesus ours, but church.
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Jesus is never ashamed of us.
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Think about that.
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Imagine this conversation where the devil's like, "Mark Ward, huh?
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Mark Ward, Jesus.
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He's one of yours, huh?" Jesus says, "Yes, He is." The devil's like, "Did you see what He did this week?
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Did you hear the way He talked to that person this week?
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Did you see what He did?" Jesus says, "I see everything." You're not ashamed of him?
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Jesus says, "Not for a second.
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I'm not ashamed because I pronounced him holy and he's my brother.
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I am not ashamed of him." And that tells me I don't have to walk around with guilt and with shame with my head down.
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I'm such a loser.
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must be so ashamed of me because I knew I shouldn't have done this and I did it anyways and I just can't seem to get it right and God should be so embarrassed of me and God should be so ashamed of me and your Bible says something completely different.
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Your Bible says He is not ashamed.
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I can walk in humble confidence because Jesus has pronounced me holy and He is not ashamed of me.
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If you're sitting here today and you've received Christ as your Lord and Savior, He's not ashamed of you no matter how bad you blow it.
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No matter how bad you mess up.
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He's not ashamed.
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And finally for today, God was with us, not just to be my substitute, not just to be my sanctifier, but God was with us to be my sympathizer.
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Jump down to verse 16.
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The Hebrew writer says, "For surely it is not angels that He helps, but He helps the offspring of Abraham.
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Therefore, He had to be made like His brothers in every respect, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
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I want to stop here for a second.
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This word "propitiation," it's a big word.
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It's used a couple times in the Bible, but it's a very important word.
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What that word means-- write this down-- the word "propitiation" means God is satisfied with the work of Christ.
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That's so important.
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It means that God is satisfied.
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When Jesus died on the cross, remember He cried out, "It is finished." Meaning paid in full.
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Your sin has been covered completely.
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Taken away. Forgiven. Forever.
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The word "propitiation" goes along with that.
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God is satisfied.
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When Jesus gave His life as a substitute for you, God's not still mad at you.
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That's why he's not ashamed.
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He's not still mad.
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God's not up in heaven like, "Oh, I know He received my son as His Savior." "Oh, I'm going to punish Him for the things that He's done." Not at all.
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God says, "I'm satisfied.
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My wrath was poured out on My Son, and because He received My Son, I have no wrath to pour out on this person." That's what propitiation means.
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God is satisfied with the work of Jesus.
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So God's not mad at you.
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Look at this last phrase.
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It says in verse 18, "For because He Himself has suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted." God was one of us.
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He was literally human.
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and every respect, and what it means to be human, it's very clear the Hebrew writer is teaching us that Jesus came to feel everything that we feel.
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Yes, Jesus performed miracles and walked on water and healed.
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But when you read your Gospels, you see that Jesus - God in the flesh - Jesus experienced thirst.
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Jesus got tired.
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The Bible says that Jesus even wept on multiple occasions.
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So this gives God - understand how I mean this - this gives God a sort of special dimension of understanding through experience.
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Now, I am not saying that God lacked knowledge in something, and God was like, well, I guess the only way I'm going to find out this information about being human is to become a human.
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I'm not saying that God lacked the knowledge.
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Here's what I am saying.
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Church, we can't ever say to God, you have no idea what it's like to live in a body like this and to be surrounded by people like this.
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You have no idea what it's like, God.
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Because of the incarnation, Because God became a man, He knows.
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Have you ever been betrayed by someone?
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Have you ever been betrayed?
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Jesus knows what that's like.
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One of His best friends betrayed Him for a handful of coins.
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Have you ever been rejected?
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Jesus knows what that's like.
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Even His own family rejected Him during His earthly ministry.
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Have you ever been misunderstood?
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Jesus understands what that's like.
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Have you ever been just so exhausted and your body is just so tired, but there's so much to do ahead of you?
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He understands.
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He knows.
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Have you ever been tempted?
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Every one of us have.
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is actually if you turn the page, Hebrews 4.15 says that Jesus was tempted in every respect. Tempted as we are, yet was without sin. Jesus was tempted in every respect. Like, well what does that mean? I'm not the world's greatest Bible scholar, but my understanding of that verse is that Jesus was tempted in every single way that a human being can be tempted and you can fill in a lot of blanks there and say really do you think he was tempted like this do you think he was tempted like that the Bible says he was tempted in every way yet was without sin he never gave into the temptation but you have to know that he knows and this is important for us to know that he He knows because, remember that Isaiah 9, 6 passage, it says, "He will be called" - do you remember the first phrase, pop quiz, what was the first phrase?
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"He will be called wonderful counselor." You know the best counsel, the best counsel that you can get comes from someone who's experienced the things that you're going through.
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For example, take a victim of domestic violence.
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If a victim of domestic violence comes to me for counseling, I can offer some counsel, I can offer some comfort, and I can offer some encouragement, but I can't do it in the same way as someone who has lived through it.
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The Bible tells us that God became a man.
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And forever answers the question, does God really understand?
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Does God really understand?
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God was with us to be my sympathizer in every way.
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If I were Jesus, just imagine the Father saying, okay, now's the time that God's going to become a man live on the earth and offer as a sacrifice.
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If I were the son, I could imagine asking the father, hey, you know what, instead of just going through all of this stuff, how about I just show up as an adult, die on the cross, raise from the dead, and just go back to heaven?
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We can get this salvation thing done in three days.
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But he didn't do that, did he?
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He decided to live a total human experience.
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When God became a man, He didn't just step down from Heaven.
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He came through the womb of a woman in the manner that every other human being after Adam and Eve came into the world.
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Church, this is worth celebrating.
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At Christmas, we marvel again that God was with us as one of us.
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In just a moment, we're going to invite you to come down and pray.
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Maybe there's somebody here this morning that says, you know, I've never received Jesus Christ as my substitute.
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believing that He took my place on the cross.
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I can't think of a better time to come down and pray with somebody from our prayer team.
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Maybe there's somebody here that says, you know, Pastor Jeff, I've been in this depression for a long time.
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And to be honest with you, I've felt like a Christian loser.
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And I've felt like God must be You're so embarrassed by Me.
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I'd like to remind you today that He's your sanctifier.
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And He's not ashamed of you.
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Maybe you need to come down and pray and be reminded of that.
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Maybe there's somebody here that says, you know what, I've been really struggling with something, and so often in my prayers, I just feel like my prayers are only making it to the ceiling and God's not really hearing my prayers.
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And I wonder sometimes if God even understands or cares what I'm going through, when the truth of the matter is He was here.
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And He experienced everything that we go through so that He can be a merciful and sympathetic High Priest.
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Will you bow your heads and pray with me?
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And as our worship team leads us in a closing song, we're going to invite you to come up front and pray.
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Father in Heaven, we thank You that Your Word is so clear on the significance of the incarnation.
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Because, Father, we realize that if You didn't literally become a man, You couldn't literally be our substitute.
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If You didn't literally become a man, Jesus couldn't call us brothers.
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There's nowhere in Your Word, Father, that You call us brothers.
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This Word tells us that You are our Heavenly Father.
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But somehow Jesus through His death and His resurrection now calls us His brothers.
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Father, if You didn't become a man, we would be wondering if You really understood what the human experience was like.
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What it was like to be tempted.
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And what it was like to experience the things that these human bodies experience The Incarnation forever answers the question, "Yes, you do. You understand." Father, we thank you for as simple and profound as it is, for as marvelous and mysterious as it is, we thank you for what we truly have to celebrate this Christmas season.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Hebrews 2:9-18
Why is it necessary that Jesus be fully God AND fully human? Would he be able to be a substitute/sanctifier/sympathizer if He wasn't fully God AND fully human? Why or why not?
What have you done with this good news? Have you offered this gift to anyone else?
Breakout Questions:
Who do you know that needs to know the life of Christ? Pray for that person by name.