Introduction:
Who is Jesus For? (Luke 2:1-21)
- Jesus is for people who make Him Priority . (Luke 2:7)
Colossians 1:18 - And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent...
- Jesus is for who are actively Seeking Him. (Luke 2:8-16)
Proverbs 2:3-5 - ...if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God.
- Jesus is for people who need a Savior . (Luke 2:11)
Matthew 1:21 - She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.
If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator;
If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist;
If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist;
If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer;
But our greatest need was forgiveness, so God sent us a Savior.Mark 2:17 - "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:00-00:04
Open your Bibles with me please to Luke chapter 2.
00:06-00:14
We're beginning a series, "Baby's First Christmas." And here's what we're going to be doing over the next three messages.
00:14-00:20
We're going to just simply be looking at the people that were there when Jesus was a baby.
00:22-00:34
He didn't exactly have a baby shower, but we see people that were profoundly impacted by Jesus even when he was an infant.
00:34-00:35
That's what we're doing.
00:36-00:37
Luke chapter 2.
00:39-00:43
While you're turning there, I'm going to tell you a joke.
00:43-00:43
You want to hear a joke?
00:45-00:46
All right.
00:48-00:54
I think somebody just made one and I'm thankful that I'm hard of hearing, I guess.
00:55-00:56
All right, so here it is.
00:58-00:59
Darren I know you know this one.
01:01-01:14
So this cowboy goes into a saloon and sits down at the bar and the bartender says, "What do you have?" Cowboy says, "Root beer," because it's a church joke.
01:15-01:16
(audience laughs)
01:17-01:24
And the bartender gives him his root beer, and he drinks it, and he says, "Can I get you anything else?" And the cowboy says, "Are you crazy?
01:24-01:32
"I need to get going because Big Zeke's coming." The bartender's like, "Who's Big Zeke?" Cowboy says, "You don't know who Big Zeke is.
01:33-01:48
"Big Zeke is the biggest, nastiest, meanest, "most violent, vicious, ruthless, bloodthirsty cowboy ever." He's on his way here, and I ain't gonna be here when he gets here, because when Big Zeke shows up, everybody gets hurt.
01:50-02:12
So he takes off, and the bartender's standing there like, "Huh." Well, sure enough, about 40 minutes later, the door is kicked in, and in walks a cowboy, six foot seven, 400 pounds if he was an ounce.
02:14-02:21
He was wearing a coat made out of a buffalo, and I don't mean buffalo skin.
02:22-02:25
It was an actual buffalo draped over his shoulders.
02:28-02:34
He had a rattlesnake belt, And I don't mean a rattlesnake skin belt.
02:35-02:39
I mean around his waist was a rattlesnake, too scared to let go.
02:40-02:43
He had spurs the size of dinner plates.
02:45-02:55
And he sits down, the bartender's trembling, 'cause his words go back to the previous customer.
02:56-03:08
The bartender says, "What can I get you?" And the enormous cowboy says, "I'll have a root beer." Because it's a church joke.
03:09-03:10
That part didn't change.
03:12-03:26
And the bartender, shaking, brings it over and sets it down and he says, "Sir, will there be anything else?" The big cowboy looks down at him, he goes, "Are you crazy?
03:27-03:28
I'm going to get out of here.
03:28-04:56
Zeke's coming. You see the birth of Jesus is actually the exact opposite of that story because Israel was expecting a Messiah and many people missed him even though he actually arrived. But not everybody missed him. So again we're going to look at the people that were there when Jesus was born. Luke chapter 2, are you there? Pick up in verse 1, it says, "In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered." It's like a census, right? It says, "This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria, and went up from Galilee from the town of Nazareth to Judea to the city of David which is called Bethlehem because he was of the house and lineage of David to be registered with Mary his betrothed who was with child while they were there the time came for her to give birth and she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger because there was no place for them in the end.
04:57-05:10
So the census brought Joseph and Mary back to the hometown and that was actually to fulfill the prophecy that the Christ, the promised Messiah, would be born in Bethlehem.
05:10-05:15
Micah actually pronounced that 700 years prior to this event.
05:17-05:21
So the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem was about 90 miles.
05:23-05:25
And Joseph and Mary probably didn't have a minivan.
05:26-05:27
Okay?
05:27-05:32
So imagine, very pregnant, 90 mile journey.
05:34-05:41
We have Mary pregnant by the Holy Spirit conceiving within her womb, and she arrives in time to have the baby.
05:43-06:14
up in verse 8. It says, "And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field keeping watch over their flock by night and an angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them and they were filled with fear. The angel said to them, 'Fear not for behold I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people for unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
06:16-06:17
And this will be a sign for you.
06:18-06:21
You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.
06:22-06:38
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased." And the angels went away from them into heaven.
06:39-06:55
The shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us." And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger.
06:57-07:06
And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning the child, and all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.
07:07-07:13
But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart.
07:14-07:21
And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them.
07:21-07:31
And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
07:32-07:51
Now if you grew up in the church or even attended church the last several years consecutively at all, you're kind of familiar with the story, right?
07:51-07:53
You don't even have to go to church to be familiar with the story.
07:54-08:00
We can hear about it in Christmas shows and programs and cartoons.
08:03-08:06
But can we just take a step back here for a second?
08:07-08:15
Because some of us are so familiar with this story that we forget how strange it is.
08:17-08:20
Because it's really a strange story when you think about it.
08:21-08:34
I mean, imagine you're God's PR person, and God says, "Hey, we're going to let the world know that the Almighty Sovereign of the universe is becoming a man.
08:34-08:37
How are we going to let the world know?" I mean, what would you do?
08:39-08:43
I know you'd be like, "Okay, we're going to have to hit the big social media, right?
08:43-09:02
We're going to have to get on Facebook and Instagram and Twitter, and we're going to have to blast it out that way." Maybe some of you would say, "Well, we'll call CNN, and we'll call Fox News." And like, "Well, they didn't have that sort of platform back then, Jeff." But okay, so what if you lived in these days?
09:05-09:12
What if you lived during Jesus' day, and God said, "I'm coming to the earth." Like, who would you tell?
09:13-09:14
The high priest?
09:15-09:16
The Sanhedrin?
09:17-09:22
You know the religious ruling body over Israel, would you tell them?
09:23-09:24
What about Herod?
09:25-09:27
We'll just go right to the top, we'll tell the king, right?
09:29-09:30
That's not God's way.
09:32-09:38
What we see is God told a group of shepherds, and that's really strange.
09:39-09:44
And if that's not strange enough, again our familiarity sometimes helps us gloss over it.
09:45-09:48
Think about how strange the news itself is.
09:48-09:49
Look at verse 11 again.
09:51-09:55
For unto you is born this day in the city of David.
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Unto you, underline that.
09:59-10:01
Because that's not a typical baby announcement.
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Like, "Hey, somebody's having a baby for you." Like, I don't remember signing up for that.
10:10-10:12
Somebody's doing what for me?
10:12-10:13
But that's the announcement.
10:16-10:25
And that's simply what I want to look at for a few minutes this morning is, just to answer one question, who is Jesus for?
10:27-10:30
Like there's this announcement that somebody had a baby for you.
10:31-10:31
For who?
10:32-10:32
For me.
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Yeah.
10:36-10:38
Well, how do I know Jesus is for me?
10:40-11:07
from this story, I just want to look at three things. Who is Jesus for? Who is Jesus for? Write this down. Number one, Jesus is for people who make him priority. Jesus is for people who make him priority. Have you ever been part of a church that does, you know, every Christmas they get the kids to reenact the nativity scene? You ever seen that in the church? You ever seen that? Anybody?
11:07-11:08
Okay, thank you.
11:08-11:08
Alright.
11:10-11:11
I can start over.
11:12-11:14
Okay, this cowboy goes into a...
11:17-11:18
Nativity, okay.
11:19-11:26
So I remember we grew up in the Methodist church, and I was so excited because they were doing the Nativity play, Jay.
11:26-11:31
And I was like, "Yes!" I'm like, "I'm going to land a big role this year." Do you know what role I got?
11:32-11:33
The innkeeper.
11:35-11:37
And do you know what that role entails?
11:38-11:42
You got to stand there and tell pregnant Mary that there ain't no room in your inn.
11:43-11:44
I felt like such a jerk.
11:46-11:58
Like here comes pregnant Mary, just made the 90 mile trip, and I'm like, "Sorry, there's no room for you, little pregnant Jewish lady." I mean, what a jerk, right?
11:58-11:59
Not me, the innkeeper.
12:01-12:05
But we might be shocked to discover there is no innkeeper.
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The Bible doesn't talk about an innkeeper.
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What does the text say?
12:10-12:14
It says there was no room, verse 7, in the inn.
12:17-12:20
Now that word for inn is the word kataluma.
12:21-12:25
And sometimes it helps us to understand the Bible when we look at, okay, here's how a word is used here.
12:25-12:27
Is that word used any place else in the Bible?
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And actually it is.
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In Mark 14, 14, it refers to the upper room.
12:35-12:47
The kataluma was a guest chamber, and actually in the Greek, there was a completely different word for a hotel or a motel, like an inn.
12:47-12:49
That's a completely different word.
12:49-12:52
That's not really a great translation of this word.
12:53-12:55
There was no room for them in the guest room.
12:58-13:07
Meaning this, the animals often were kept downstairs on the ground level, sort of like a barn or what we would call the garage.
13:09-13:20
So because there wasn't room in the upper room in the guest room, in our vernacular it would be like saying Mary had to have the baby in the garage.
13:22-14:11
And I want to share a story with you. I know some of you have heard this, but I want you to humor me for those who haven't because I think it's such an appropriate illustration here. But many years ago we did a wedding and we were all dressed up, you know. Erin was with me. She looked like a trillion dollars. I had my suit on. I looked like about 75 cents, but still she looked she looked amazing. And okay, so we went down to, we had the wedding and we went down to the receptionist at the place around, I think it was the Days Inn on Route 8. And so we show up and we get into the lobby where there's the table with the seating assignments. And we're just standing there. It was alphabetized.
14:11-14:26
and I'm like, "Which table are we?" And Aaron's like, "I don't see us." And I'm like, "I don't see us either." And then it dawned on us that we weren't invited to the reception and we had to leave.
14:28-14:30
And that was embarrassing.
14:32-14:33
But it gets worse.
14:34-14:44
Because we were all gussied up, I'm like, "We're still going out to eat." So we just went a little further down the road to the hardwood, and we had a nice dinner, just the two of us there.
14:44-15:02
It's probably better than having the reception with a bunch of people we really didn't know that well anyways, but when we got back in the car, I looked in the back seat and saw that I had the couple's marriage license in the back seat.
15:03-15:10
And they needed it for the honeymoon and all the legal stuff there.
15:11-15:16
And I thought to myself, oh no, I gotta go back in there.
15:17-15:21
You know, the place where I wasn't invited the first time, I gotta go back in.
15:22-15:31
And not just in the lobby, I gotta track the groom down and give him his, and believe you me, I was trying so hard to think of a way out of this.
15:32-15:33
And there just wasn't.
15:34-15:45
And so I walk in, go up to the head table, And I said, "Hey, I'm so sorry I forgot to give you this "and all your paperwork's in there that you need.
15:46-15:57
"You know, hope you have a great honeymoon." And I'm walking away and I got probably, you know, 20, 25 feet away and he hollers nice and loud for everyone to hear.
15:58-16:12
He goes, "Hey, Jeff, if you're hungry, "I think there's some leftovers in the kitchen." I'm like, "Leftovers?" Like, do you realize what goes into a wedding?
16:12-16:14
Do you realize what goes into that from my perspective?
16:14-16:30
We did weeks and weeks and weeks of counseling, and I helped plan the wedding ceremony, and I helped with the rehearsal, and all the headaches that often go with that, and I helped plan the whole thing, and execute the whole thing, and you're offering me crumbs from your table?
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Like, do you know who I am?
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I'm the pastor!
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Leftovers.
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Leftovers!
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But that's the point of the manger, because that's what Jesus got.
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There was no room for Him where we'd let the people sleep.
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But you can have the leftovers.
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Creator God, awesome God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God who keeps His covenant.
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Do you remember Him?
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He's coming to the earth, He's coming to die a horrible death for our sin.
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And we're like, yeah, you can just go ahead and have that baby where we keep the animals.
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That's fine.
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We don't have any room for you where the people sleep.
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And before we get all judgy, like, yep, yep, shame on, shame on whoever made this happen, shame on them, shame on them.
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Before we get too judgy, maybe you need to examine your own life and see if leftovers is still what Jesus is getting.
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If you're like, "You know, it's so hard for me to find time to read my Bible.
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It's hard for me to find time to get involved in church at all.
17:58-18:43
A small group I think I signed up, but I haven't really been able to go, and I just don't really have the time. It just seems like every minute Alex has spoken for, every minute, whether it's work or hobbies or sports, I mean all the stuff that my kids in, and then I found out there's this new series on Netflix I want to watch, and I just can't seem to squeeze Jesus into the schedule. Leftovers! You're I'll throw up a quick one in the car while I'm driving to work, or I'll pray at the end of the day, but honestly, usually I fall asleep.
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It's called leftovers.
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I read the Bible on my own.
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I read the Bible on my own.
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Do you?
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Yeah, yeah.
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It was a couple weeks ago.
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I read, I think it was a Psalm, maybe?
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Leftovers.
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And really, it's no different than, there's no room in the guest room.
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You can have your baby in the barn.
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The Bible makes this incredible statement about Jesus.
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Colossians 1.18 says, "He is the head of the body, the church.
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He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent." You know that's how this church started?
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That was the year one theme.
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Jesus is first.
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Because according to the Bible, He is to have the preeminence in everything.
19:57-19:59
But the question is, does He have the first place in you?
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I mean, imagine this story.
20:04-20:24
What if Joseph and Mary showed up, and let's just pretend for a second, can we pretend that whoever had the jurisdiction over who was allowed to stay in the guest room, what if they knew who it was that Mary had in her womb?
20:27-20:28
How do you think the story would have played out then?
20:31-20:38
He would have gone to that room and whoever was in there, I don't care if it's the Pope or Elvis or who, whoever was in there.
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It's like, hey, Jack, you get out.
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I just got you're going to have to get out because God needs this room.
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And it's the same for us, church.
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When you recognize who Jesus is.
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You make room for.
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You bump him up to the VIP priority position, and sometimes that means saying no to good things because they're lesser things. Because I want Jesus to have the first place. So Jesus is for people who make him priority. Secondly, Jesus is for people who are actively seeking him. Jesus is for people who are actively seeking him. Again, we kind of said this at beginning, it's strange that the angel appeared to shepherds. Why not rabbis or the high priest or kings? Why is it so strange that this angel appeared to shepherds? Because some of you still might not think that's strange, because Now, we tend to glorify shepherds.
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And I get why.
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Because when you read your Bible, being a shepherd sounds like a pretty sweet deal, right?
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Because Adam was a shepherd, right?
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And Abel, and Jacob, and Moses, and David.
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I guess quite a gallery of famous shepherds.
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But you have to understand, in Jesus' day, it wasn't like that.
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Do you know how they viewed shepherds?
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Bottom of the barrel people.
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Ignorant, uneducated, because they couldn't keep the rules that the Pharisees prescribed.
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You know, the Pharisees made up like 600 and some rules.
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You had to keep these rules and they mainly circled around keeping the Sabbath.
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shepherds were just unable to keep those rules because of their jobs.
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And in Jesus' day, shepherds weren't even allowed to testify in court because they were considered garbage people.
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Like, you can't trust a shepherd.
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They weren't allowed to testify.
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They were outcasts.
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And that is who God chose to receive the greatest news in history.
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I've got to tell you, it doesn't make sense.
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And if you're expecting me to spin this in some way where it makes sense, I can't do it.
23:22-23:23
We just finished a series in John.
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Who was the first person that got the announcement that the Lord resurrected from the dead?
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Who was the first person?
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Mary Magdalene.
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Like, who was she?
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Nobody!
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From the world's perspective, she was a nobody.
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But from God's perspective, He goes, "Yeah, she's going to be the first person that finds out about this." And I think it's interesting in our story that you don't really see the shepherds being specifically told to go.
23:52-23:54
But they really didn't need to be, did they?
23:56-24:01
Like man, this story gives me so many more questions than answers sometimes when I really think about it.
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Like how did they find Mary and Joseph?
24:06-24:10
Like the angel gave them three clues, like look, a baby was born.
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That's clue number one.
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Swaddling cloths, clue number two.
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Lying in a manger, clue number three.
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Good luck.
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And how did they find him?
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Did they run around knocking on doors?
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Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, baby's laying in a feeding trough in here.
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Okay, sorry to bother you.
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I don't know.
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But I do think it's funny that Mary travels 90 miles, has the baby in the garage barn thing, and a bunch of gnarly strangers just show up.
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I mean, for those of you that are parents, can you put yourself in that scenario?
24:56-25:05
Can you think back to when you had your child or one of your children, and you're in the hospital, and push, and, oh, congratulations, it's a boy.
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And all of a sudden, this group of gnarly, dirty people just run into your room, "Oh, you've got a baby here.
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Oh, we heard about this." You're like, "Who are you?" "Oh, it's okay.
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God told us about this." What?
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But you see, the shepherds did the simplest and most important thing a person can do.
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They responded to God's Word.
25:33-25:36
You know, oftentimes in the church we talk about seeking the Lord, right?
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You say you've got to seek the Lord, and the Bible says seek the Lord, seek the Lord, and that's literally what the shepherds did.
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I want to clarify something, because seeking the Lord absolutely does not imply that He's hiding.
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Okay?
25:56-25:58
Actually, Acts 17 says He is not far from any of this.
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But the Lord's not hiding.
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And the shepherds were literally given the information in order to find Him.
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And we too have been given the information so that we too may find the Lord.
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What matters is what we do with the information.
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And really that's what seeking the Lord is.
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It's hearing His Word and responding, having the desire to know Him and going after Him according to His Word.
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Okay?
26:41-26:45
So seeking the Lord isn't hide and seek.
26:48-26:58
It isn't, "Gosh, I hope I can find Him." It's simply being willing to respond to His Word.
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That's what it means.
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Proverbs 2 puts it this way.
27:05-27:27
It says, "If you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God." Now this passage is about seeking the Lord, specifically seeking the wisdom of the Lord, which is seeking the Lord.
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But notice it says that you need to be searching like it was money.
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Meaning this, if I gave you a treasure map, it's your neighborhood, and I said, "Hey, this map will take you to a place in your neighborhood and you'll find hidden treasure worth $10 billion, but the map was written in Spanish.
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Would you learn Spanish?
27:58-27:59
Si, you're like, si.
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Si, senor.
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Si, jefe.
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Or you could just call Martha, right?
28:10-28:10
That's cheating.
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You can't find loopholes in my sermon illustrations.
28:15-28:15
(audience laughing)
28:17-28:23
Look, you see, you get these people to find these loopholes in these illustrations.
28:25-28:28
Well, I appreciate that, but that's not where I was going with this.
28:31-28:31
We're just moving on.
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I think you get the point.
28:35-28:36
We're having fun, right?
28:36-28:39
We're having, but I think you get the point.
28:42-28:49
There has to be like this diligence and this desire this on your part, like I want to know.
28:50-28:58
And I'm not sure how much the shepherds really understood the impact of the message that they were given here.
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I mean how much did they really comprehend do you think?
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This is God taking the form of man.
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And we're going to see him.
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I don't know.
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But they responded to it, I do know that.
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They responded.
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And when Jesus is your priority, seeking Him and His Word isn't something I need to talk you into.
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Like the shepherd, you hear the message from God about His Son and you don't debate it.
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You don't consider it, you just get moving on it, like the shepherd, right?
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They just got moving immediately.
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So should we.
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So who is Jesus for finally?
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And this is like last and most important by the way.
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This isn't like last and least.
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This is top of the mountain here.
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Jesus is for people who need a Savior.
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Back to the announcement, verse 11.
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unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior." What does that imply?
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That implies that He came to save people.
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Save them from what?
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Well fortunately we have another birth announcement in Matthew chapter 1 verse 21.
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It says, "She will bear a son and you shall call His name Jesus for He will save His people from their sins." This is the kind of savior that was announced.
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I came across this quote probably a couple decades ago now, and I had it written down.
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I'm going to share it with you.
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I don't know who.
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It's not original with me.
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All right?
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You can probably Google it and find out if you're really interested.
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And you're like, "Yeah, Jeff, why didn't you do that?" And now that I'm standing up here, it seems like I probably should have done that.
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Here's the quote.
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If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator.
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If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist.
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If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist.
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If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer.
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But our greatest need was forgiveness.
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So God sent us a Savior.
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And I think it's easy with all of the stuff associated with this season, that that part of the message sort of gets buried.
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'Cause we're all about the decorations and parties and appointments and presents, and I'm not giving you a guilt trip on that at all.
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We do that stuff too.
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I'm just saying this is the part of the message sometimes.
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It gets a little suppressed, put on the back burner.
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The fact that this baby that's born is first and foremost called a savior.
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That baby grew up and had an incredible ministry.
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We just spent three years looking at one account of it, but in a different account, in Mark chapter two, verse 17, that baby grew up, and this was something profound that he said.
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Jesus said, "Those who are well "have no need of a physician, "but those who are sick.
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"I came not to call the righteous, "but sinners.
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And the question is, when does someone go to a doctor?
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You know I need your reaction to that, right?
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"Oh, you go to the doctor when you're sick." And that's not true.
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You go to the doctor when you know that you're sick.
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And it's the same with Jesus.
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You won't come to Him to be saved until you know that you are a sinner guilty before God.
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Who is Jesus for?
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And if you're sitting here listening to this, if you're watching this stream or watching this on replay sometime later, you can say, "I'm not really that bad of a person.
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I don't really think that I'm a sinner.
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Actually, then you're not going to think that Jesus is for you.
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Because first and foremost, He is a Savior.
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Jesus isn't about warm, fuzzy Christmas sentimentality or come to church out of religious obligation.
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He is the one, He is the only one who can save you from your sin.
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if you're willing to turn from your sin and believe in Him.
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And really, that's who Jesus is for.
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And the shepherds, as far as I can see, they didn't become apostles or pastors, but they did become the first New Testament missionaries of Jesus.
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like seeking Jesus in the first place, they didn't need talked into this either.
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And here we see Jesus' impact even as a baby completely changed their lives.
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So as we get deeper into the holiday season, let's not reduce the story of Jesus to merely the strangest birth announcement of all time.
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baby came into the world to save you from your sins.
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So as our worship team comes forward, the question is, "Who is Jesus for?" You're like, "Everyone!" That's what I want to say initially, but not everyone received Him.
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So who is Jesus for?
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I think a better word to use there, he's for anyone.
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He is for anyone who is willing to recognize him for who he is, allowing him first place in their lives, anyone who is willing to actively seek him, anyone who realizes that they need a Savior.
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That's who Jesus is for.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, I pray that you would just grip our hearts in a fresh way with this message.
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Some of us have heard this dozens of times over the years.
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And it is no less astounding today as it was when it happened.
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There's a lot of questions that I have about this passage.
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How did the shepherds find Jesus?
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What did it look like when the angel showed up?
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There's a lot of questions that we have, Father, but that's really not the important thing.
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The most clear thing about this passage is you sent a Savior that we are to seek after and allow to have the first place in our lives.
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So Father, I pray that you would bring us to a recognition of who we are, a sobering self-examination, so that we realize that Jesus is for me.
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To your glory and honor, we pray in Jesus' name.
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Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read Luke 2:1-21
What was your big “take-away” from this passage / message?
In what ways have you made Jesus a priority in your life? Have you been guilty of giving Him leftovers? If so, what changes do you need to make?
Why do you think God chose the shepherds to give the big birth announcement to?
How would you explain to a non-believer what it means to “seek the Lord”?
Breakout
Pray for one another.