Did You Find Jesus?

Introduction:

What's True About People Who Find Jesus:

1. They made Room for Jesus. (Luke 2:1-7)



inn = kataluma

Mark 14:14 - and wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, 'The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?' = guest chamber

2. They Actively went after Jesus. (Luke 2:8-16)



Isaiah 61:1 - The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound

1 Corinthians 1:27 - But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong



3. They are never the Same. (Luke 2:17-20)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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• Audio Transcript

  00:49-01:08

  Open up your Bibles with me please to the gospel according to Luke and we are going to be in chapter 2. Do you know what I think is funny about people? I just think this is weird about people in general. We like to look for things, don't we?

  01:10-01:20

  As kids we play hide-and-seek, right? When we were kids we played a game called "Ghost in the Graveyard." You remember playing "Ghost in the Graveyard" up at camp?

  01:20-01:22

  And it was like reverse hide and seek.

  01:24-01:26

  We like to do word searches.

  01:26-01:29

  How many people here, show of hands, let's be honest, how many people like to do word searches?

  01:31-01:32

  Many more than I thought.

  01:33-01:36

  People spend money on books to look for words.

  01:36-01:38

  I'm like, I didn't lose them, you find them.

  01:38-01:40

  But people love word searches.

  01:41-01:44

  How about "Where's Waldo?" Show of hands, how many people know what "Where's Waldo" is?

  01:46-01:52

  "Where's Waldo?" Okay, we have some young people looking up here like, who's Waldo?

  01:54-01:57

  But we bought these books to find Waldo.

  01:59-02:04

  The newest way that we like to look for things, did you see this, they have these apps now.

  02:04-02:05

  Did you see these?

  02:05-02:10

  They're apps where you're like a detective or something, and you gotta find the clues in the scene.

  02:10-02:13

  You have this little scene, and you gotta find, how many people know what I'm talking about?

  02:14-02:18

  Okay, you gotta find like pictures in the scene, like a desk or something.

  02:18-02:20

  It's like, you know, find the bunny or whatever.

  02:20-02:21

  And he's like in the wood grain.

  02:22-02:29

  And I can barely see my phone, let alone seeing these little images of these things on the phone.

  02:30-02:34

  I just think it's funny how we love to try to find things until we lose our car keys.

  02:36-02:37

  And it's not so fun, is it?

  02:39-02:41

  But here's a Christmas version I just learned about.

  02:42-02:43

  Elf on the shelf.

  02:43-02:45

  How many people know about Elf on the shelf?

  02:46-02:49

  All right, since we're being honest here, how many people here have an elf on the shelf?

  02:52-02:53

  Much less than I thought.

  02:53-02:59

  I think some of you need to put your word search books down and go get yourself an elf on the shelf.

  03:00-03:03

  We just got ours this year, so it's been an education for me.

  03:04-03:07

  Our elf, believe it or not, our elf was named after you, Jay Naur.

  03:08-03:09

  Our elf's name is Jay.

  03:10-03:11

  No, I'm dead serious.

  03:11-03:13

  His name is Jay Peppermint.

  03:16-03:16

  That's a true story.

  03:19-03:27

  But as adults, maybe we don't look for the elf at Christmas but we like to play other finding games at Christmas.

  03:27-03:33

  We like to play find the decorations, find the right Christmas cards, find that recipe for fruitcake.

  03:34-03:35

  Don't.

  03:37-03:41

  Find the perfect present, find the best sale, find the right gift card.

  03:41-03:48

  And we get so caught up in looking for all of these things This morning, I want to look at the real question.

  03:50-03:51

  Did you find Jesus?

  03:54-03:54

  Did you find Jesus?

  03:57-04:01

  Now look, I'm not trying to be Scrooge, okay?

  04:02-04:04

  We have a Christmas tree at our house.

  04:04-04:07

  We have an elf at our house named Jay Peppermint, okay?

  04:07-04:11

  I'm not this anti-Christmas, pulpit-pounding, okay?

  04:11-04:12

  I'm not that guy.

  04:12-04:17

  I'm just saying, can we step back and let's just be totally objective and honest for a second.

  04:19-04:29

  For a holiday about Jesus, most of our time and money are spent on things that have nothing to do with Jesus, true or false.

  04:31-04:33

  So the question this morning is, did you find Jesus?

  04:34-04:40

  And I want us to find that answer from very familiar characters in God's Word.

  04:40-04:41

  So let's look at Luke 2.

  04:43-04:48

  It says, "In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered.

  04:49-04:53

  This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria.

  04:54-05:00

  And all want to be registered, each to his own town." Okay, so this was the census.

  05:01-05:15

  But instead of sending the person door to door, by the way, I did that part-time, last census, and Lord willing I will never do it again my family is starving to death." But that's how they did their census.

  05:15-05:18

  You went back to your hometown to register.

  05:18-05:22

  It was completely different than the misery I went through, but they had a different kind of misery, we're going to find out.

  05:23-05:40

  It says, "And Joseph went up from Galilee to 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.

  05:42-05:46

  While they were there, the time came for her to give birth.

  05:47-05:59

  Okay, so the census brought them to their hometown to fulfill the prophecy that the Christ, the Messiah, the promised Savior would be born in the city of Bethlehem.

  05:59-06:05

  You know, Micah the prophet pronounced that about 700 years prior to these events.

  06:05-06:08

  This is the spot where the Messiah is going to be born.

  06:08-06:12

  This is the town where the Christ is coming.

  06:12-06:18

  So the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem was about 90 miles.

  06:19-06:20

  So help me out here.

  06:20-06:22

  What's about 90 miles from this spot?

  06:23-06:23

  Any ideas?

  06:25-06:25

  Erie?

  06:26-06:26

  Okay.

  06:27-06:38

  So imagine ladies being just about due and making a trip up towards Erie.

  06:40-06:50

  By the way, not in your car, maybe on the back of a donkey, even though the Bible doesn't say how she traveled, but it wasn't in luxury.

  06:52-06:58

  The Mary, pregnant by the Holy Spirit, conceiving within her womb, arrives in time.

  06:59-07:14

  And look at verse 7, it says, "And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and lied him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn." Like, what?

  07:16-07:24

  So they make this trip and they get into town, and it says, "She laid him in a manger." That's a feeding trough.

  07:24-07:27

  That's where they keep the straw for the cattle.

  07:30-07:41

  It says, "There was no place for them in the inn." On your outline this morning, we're going to look at what's true about people who find Jesus.

  07:42-07:44

  I'm asking you, did you find Jesus?

  07:44-07:51

  Well, we're going to see very clearly in this text, there are at least three things that are true about people who find Jesus.

  07:51-07:57

  And here's the first one, "They made room for Jesus." They made room for Jesus.

  07:59-08:02

  This is another baffling thing we see in God's Word.

  08:03-08:06

  It says there was no room for them in the inn.

  08:08-08:10

  Now we've all heard of the innkeeper, right?

  08:10-08:19

  I remember when I was a kid at the Christmas play in the Methodist church, one year I had the role of the innkeeper.

  08:19-08:25

  And my big line was telling Mary and Joseph there was no room for them in the inn.

  08:26-08:29

  Like thanks a lot, cast me as the bad guy.

  08:31-08:33

  The innkeeper is one of the biggest jerks in the Bible.

  08:35-08:41

  Well actually I don't believe that there was an innkeeper at all.

  08:43-09:20

  I mean could you imagine, let's seriously, could you imagine this nine month pregnant woman shows up and we have this idea that there's this guy that's like working the front desk at the hotel and this pregnant woman shows up it's like sorry there's really nothing I can do for you ma'am and that's not really what actually happened see but what does the text say the text says they laid him in a manger because there was no place for them in the inn now if you study the In Greek, the word for inn is kataluma.

  09:21-09:22

  Like, well, what's a kataluma?

  09:23-09:30

  Well, something that helps is if you find how that word is used in other places in Scripture, and sometimes the context makes it more clear.

  09:30-09:33

  Do you know where else in Scripture the word kataluma is used?

  09:33-09:34

  It's used in Mark 14.

  09:37-09:46

  If you look up that reference, Jesus told his disciples to prepare for the Passover meal in the Cataluma.

  09:46-09:48

  It was the guest room.

  09:48-09:49

  It was an upper guest room.

  09:51-09:55

  So they didn't roll into town and show up at the hotel and there wasn't room in the hotel.

  09:56-09:58

  Apparently, there was a specific place.

  09:58-10:08

  We don't know what, God knows, and if he would have wanted us to know, he would have told us that apparently there was a specific house that had a specific guest room where they were planning on staying.

  10:10-10:16

  So they show up and there's no room for them in this guest room.

  10:17-10:22

  So the best that people can do, apparently from the text, is put them with the animals.

  10:23-10:26

  A lot of times that was the downstairs of the house, the first level.

  10:26-10:36

  In a lot of houses, they would have the place where the people lived upstairs, the guest room, the sleeping quarters, and then ground level would be where you keep the animals.

  10:40-10:41

  It was the barn.

  10:41-10:45

  Or another way to think of it in our vernacular in our day is it was the garage.

  10:48-10:49

  And that's where the Messiah was born.

  10:51-10:53

  I shared this story with you before.

  10:53-10:58

  I don't remember sharing the story if I told you the punchline though, because it's really the best part.

  10:58-11:09

  But several years ago, we did this wedding where Aaron and I, after doing the wedding and going through all that, we show up at the place where the reception was held and we were not on the guest list.

  11:09-11:10

  Remember I told you this story?

  11:10-11:11

  Did I tell you how this ended?

  11:12-11:17

  We were not on the guest list, so we're really embarrassed, and I'm like, oh, this is, hurry up, get out of here.

  11:17-11:18

  And so embarrassing.

  11:19-11:29

  So we go, and I take my wife to dinner because she was dressed up looking beautiful, and we were planning on having a nice meal together at this reception, that didn't happen.

  11:30-11:35

  So after we went and had dinner, we got back in the car and I realized I had this couple's marriage license still with me.

  11:35-11:41

  I'm like, oh, I gotta give that to them because they're gonna go on their honeymoon, they're going to need proof that they were married, and all these things.

  11:41-11:51

  And I had to go back into that reception hall to give them their license, and that was humiliating.

  11:52-11:55

  But that wasn't the most humiliating thing of that day.

  11:55-12:09

  I walked in, and as soon as the groom saw me, as loud as he could in front of everybody, He said, "Oh, Pastor Jeff, hey, are you hungry?

  12:10-12:17

  "Because we might have some leftovers back in the kitchen." And I'm like, "Leftovers, really?

  12:18-12:19

  "Leftovers?

  12:20-12:35

  "You mean to tell me that for the past several months "I counseled you, I arranged your wedding, "I set things up, I held the rehearsal, "I held the ceremony, I did all the paperwork "for the license, I'm the stinking pastor, "And that's what you're offering me is leftovers?

  12:36-12:40

  "Crumbs from your table?" I didn't say that.

  12:42-12:44

  But I'm gonna be honest with you, it was pretty humiliating.

  12:46-12:50

  And that's the point of the manger because that's what Jesus got.

  12:51-12:52

  Jesus got the leftovers.

  12:53-12:56

  Sorry, we can't really offer you our best.

  12:59-13:02

  But if you wanna go ahead and give birth to him in the barn, I guess you can do that.

  13:04-13:05

  Really?

  13:06-13:07

  Creator God?

  13:07-13:08

  Awesome God?

  13:08-13:09

  Remember Him?

  13:10-13:12

  Do you remember Exodus God?

  13:12-13:15

  Do you remember covenant making and keeping God?

  13:15-13:16

  Do you remember Him?

  13:17-13:18

  He's coming to the earth.

  13:20-13:25

  And we make His earthly mother lay Him down in a feeding bin for animals.

  13:28-13:39

  Before we feel too sad about that, I think maybe we should examine our own lives and see if that's what Jesus is still getting, leftovers.

  13:41-13:50

  You know, in this account there was no room in the inn, no room in the Cataluma, but maybe for you, maybe for you it's no room on my calendar.

  13:51-13:59

  Every minute is spoken for with work, hobbies, sports, kids' activities, Netflix, and we We just can't seem to squeeze Jesus into the schedule.

  14:00-14:04

  But if we have a couple of minutes, we'll throw up a quick prayer.

  14:05-14:07

  Or hopefully church won't go too long and we'll go...

  14:08-14:10

  People do that with the offering, right?

  14:11-14:13

  You realize everything you have, God gave you.

  14:14-14:17

  And when we give back to God, we should give him first and best.

  14:17-14:18

  But do you know what a lot of people do?

  14:19-14:19

  What do they give him?

  14:20-14:21

  The leftovers, right?

  14:21-14:22

  The leftovers.

  14:22-14:24

  What do I have left?

  14:26-14:31

  So before we feel too bad about no room in the inn, let's take a look at how much room we're giving Jesus.

  14:32-14:34

  No room on my calendar, how about no room in my heart?

  14:36-14:38

  Your heart only has so much capacity.

  14:41-14:44

  And we've sought to satisfy ourselves with lesser things.

  14:45-14:49

  And church, we're not hungry for the things of God for the same reason we aren't hungry for health food.

  14:50-14:51

  It's because we're full of junk.

  14:52-14:53

  But, but, but, what if?

  14:54-14:54

  What if?

  14:57-15:12

  What if whoever in this story, the person that had jurisdiction over the guest room, whatever, whoever that person was, whoever got final say on who stayed in the Cataluma, who stayed in the guest room, what if?

  15:13-15:14

  Can you pretend with me for a second?

  15:16-15:23

  What if that person knew who was going to be born that night to that woman?

  15:24-15:25

  How do you think that story would have changed?

  15:27-15:36

  If that person knew the Savior of the world, the King of the universe was about to be born, what do you think would happen?

  15:37-15:38

  I'll tell you what would happen.

  15:39-15:45

  He would have gone into that guest room and whoever was staying there would have been escorted to the barn.

  15:46-15:55

  "I'm sorry, the King of the Universe is here, you're going to have to sleep in the barn tonight." I'm not telling Jesus that He has to stay there.

  15:58-16:08

  You see, in the same way, it's only when you recognize who Jesus is, that you'll make room for Him in your life.

  16:10-16:19

  You'll bump Him up to VIP priority position, you'll say no to good things, but lesser things in your life, so you can prioritize Him.

  16:22-16:24

  You see, I can't give you a sales pitch.

  16:25-16:26

  I can't give you a guilt trip.

  16:27-16:36

  You're like, "It's too late for that." Here's the bottom line, it's only when you realize the incomparable worth of Jesus Christ.

  16:38-16:41

  As He put it, He's the treasure hidden in the field.

  16:41-16:42

  Do you remember that story in Matthew 13?

  16:44-16:46

  The guy was digging and he found a treasure worth more than anything.

  16:47-16:49

  He sold everything he had just to buy the field to get that treasure.

  16:50-16:51

  That's Jesus.

  16:51-16:54

  Jesus said it's like the merchant seeking pearls.

  16:54-16:55

  Do you remember that story?

  16:55-16:57

  He found the greatest pearl he'd ever seen.

  16:57-17:00

  He sold everything just to buy that one.

  17:02-17:03

  That's Jesus.

  17:05-17:12

  And when you recognize Him for who He is, He'll get the priority on the room in your heart.

  17:13-17:15

  That's the first thing that's true about people who find Jesus.

  17:16-17:17

  They made room for Jesus.

  17:18-17:20

  Secondly, they actively went after Jesus.

  17:21-17:24

  They actively went after Jesus.

  17:25-17:27

  Let's pick up in the text, look at verse 8.

  17:28-17:33

  It says, "In the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

  17:34-17:44

  And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.

  17:45-17:48

  Underline in your Bible that phrase, glory of the Lord.

  17:50-17:58

  Do you realize the glory of the Lord came on the earth in Exodus chapter 40, and left in Ezekiel chapters eight through 10.

  17:59-18:09

  So the glory of the Lord hasn't been on the earth centuries and now all of a sudden the glory of the Lord is back on the earth.

  18:11-18:19

  It says, "The angel said to them, 'Fear not, for behold I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.

  18:20-18:27

  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord.

  18:28-18:30

  And this will be a sign for you.

  18:31-18:35

  You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.

  18:36-19:07

  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." When the angels went away from them into heaven, 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.

  19:09-19:19

  The thing about this story that's always bothered me is why in the world did God make the announcement to shepherds of all people, right?

  19:21-19:22

  Think about that.

  19:22-19:31

  You're God and you're going to come personally in the flesh to the world.

  19:32-19:33

  How would you get word out?

  19:33-19:36

  I mean, obviously this was before the day of social media.

  19:37-19:39

  So God was like, "I'm going to tweet that I'm coming.

  19:40-19:45

  You know, #Bethlehem." He could have gone to the high priest, right?

  19:46-19:47

  He could have gone to the Sanhedrin.

  19:48-19:50

  He could have gone to the Romans.

  19:52-19:54

  I mean, those are people that would get the word out.

  19:54-19:55

  Who did he go to?

  19:56-20:02

  He went to this ragtag band of dirty shepherds out in the field?

  20:04-20:14

  Now, we sort of glorify shepherding in our minds because in our culture, we're sort of detached geographically and time-wise from the Bible.

  20:15-20:18

  Because in our minds, hey, you know, the Bible's full of great shepherds, right?

  20:19-20:26

  Adam technically was a shepherd, and Abel was a shepherd, and Jacob, and Moses, and David.

  20:26-20:28

  David wrote the shepherd's psalms, Psalm 23.

  20:28-20:33

  But in Jesus' day, understand, shepherds weren't quite revered the way we revere them.

  20:34-20:36

  In Jesus' day, shepherds had no social standing.

  20:37-20:39

  They were considered ignorant.

  20:40-20:42

  They were considered uneducated.

  20:43-20:44

  Here's the biggest problem.

  20:47-20:48

  They were considered irreverent.

  20:50-20:56

  because the shepherds by the nature of their work weren't able to keep the Pharisees' rules.

  20:56-20:58

  Remember, we talked about this when we went through Mark.

  20:59-21:01

  The Pharisees had all these rules about how to keep the Sabbath.

  21:02-21:02

  Remember that?

  21:02-21:05

  You're not allowed to do this, you're not allowed to do that, you're not allowed to do this.

  21:05-21:08

  And it's crazy the rules that they had.

  21:08-21:15

  Well, the shepherds couldn't keep their rules because it's not like, okay sheep, you're on your own for a few hours because we gotta keep the Sabbath.

  21:15-21:18

  They had to work.

  21:20-21:23

  So they were considered unclean.

  21:25-21:26

  They were considered outcasts.

  21:27-21:33

  And that is the first reason that God made the announcement to them.

  21:34-21:34

  Jot this reference down.

  21:35-21:36

  You can look it up later.

  21:37-21:43

  Isaiah 61 verse 1 says the Messiah was coming to bring good news to the poor.

  21:44-21:49

  And the prophet gives a description, but the bottom line is this.

  21:49-21:51

  His Messiah was promised to come to outcasts.

  21:53-21:59

  Jesus, as an adult, who did He hang out with?

  21:59-22:07

  Prostitutes, tax collectors, often the most unsavory people, friend of sinners.

  22:09-22:11

  And it started even with His birth, didn't it?

  22:12-22:22

  The second reason that God made the announcement to the shepherds 1 Corinthians 1:27, we have that verse.

  22:23-22:30

  It says, "But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

  22:30-22:46

  God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong." You know, I ask, why didn't God reveal all of this to the high priest, to the Sanhedrin, to the Roman, the high and mighty?

  22:48-22:49

  Because he was shaming them.

  22:50-22:51

  You're like, "Well, wait a second.

  22:52-22:54

  What do you mean he was shaming them? They didn't even know.

  22:55-22:59

  They didn't even know they were being shamed." Well, they were being shamed in God's eyes.

  23:01-23:02

  By the way, they never know.

  23:04-23:06

  They never know when they're being shamed, even today.

  23:09-23:13

  But did you notice, the shepherds weren't told specifically to go.

  23:14-23:25

  In our minds, the angels showed up and said, "Hey, I want you to go." They didn't specifically tell them to go, but did they really need to?

  23:27-23:29

  The angels just came and gave the announcement, "Hey, by the way, a baby's being born.

  23:30-23:34

  Here's the details." The shepherds sort of connected that dot in their mind, didn't they?

  23:34-23:38

  "We're going to go find him." That leads me to another question that's always bothered me.

  23:38-23:39

  How did they find Mary and Joseph?

  23:41-23:41

  How did they find him?

  23:43-23:47

  The Bible doesn't say, I think it's obvious they had to go and knock on a lot of doors, right?

  23:48-23:49

  I mean, could you imagine?

  23:51-23:55

  Living in Bethlehem in that day and it's like, any babies being born here?

  23:55-23:57

  No, no, no babies born here.

  23:57-24:00

  Okay, and they're just like running around trying to find this baby.

  24:00-24:02

  Where they show up, any babies being born?

  24:02-24:03

  Actually, yeah, we did have a baby.

  24:04-24:04

  Okay.

  24:06-24:09

  Is the baby wrapped in swaddling cloths?

  24:11-24:12

  No, actually he's not.

  24:12-24:14

  Okay, this isn't the right place.

  24:14-24:16

  Is your baby laying in an animal's feeding bowl?

  24:17-24:19

  No, he's in a bed.

  24:19-24:24

  Okay, they had to have gone house to house, but that's the point, see?

  24:27-24:32

  The shepherds believed the word of God and they acted upon it.

  24:34-24:37

  The shepherds demonstrated true biblical faith.

  24:37-24:42

  They heard from God and they acted on what they heard.

  24:42-24:45

  And that's a transition that many people don't make.

  24:47-24:49

  That's a transition many people don't make.

  24:50-24:57

  They hear the message, they hear the Christmas message, "Yep, yep, I believe that message." But they never act on what they know.

  24:58-25:00

  They never personally appropriate it.

  25:02-25:08

  And I want to remind you that you have a message from God about Jesus.

  25:09-25:14

  And that message from God about Jesus is summed up in the most famous verse in the Bible.

  25:15-25:16

  Right? John 3.16.

  25:17-25:31

  It says, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life." You have a message from God.

  25:32-25:34

  The first part of that message is, listen, God loves you.

  25:36-25:37

  God loves you.

  25:38-25:47

  Every week at the end of church we say, "You are loved." Understand that that's not for me.

  25:48-25:55

  I do love you, but that's not what I mean when I say, "You are loved." It's a reminder that you have a God in heaven who loves you.

  25:56-26:02

  No matter what you've done, no matter where you are, God loves you.

  26:03-26:10

  Because God loves you, John 3.16 says, "Because He loves you, God gave you His Son." You know, it is the season of giving, right?

  26:10-26:11

  And why do we give?

  26:13-26:16

  Giving is always the natural expression of love, isn't it?

  26:16-26:18

  When you love someone, you want to give to them.

  26:18-26:19

  It's just so natural.

  26:20-26:29

  And the Bible says that God loved the world so much that He was moved to give His only begotten Son.

  26:31-26:34

  The rest of the verse says that whosoever believes in him.

  26:34-26:37

  So we talk about belief, let's get back to the shepherds.

  26:39-26:42

  Did the shepherds believe God?

  26:43-26:48

  Well, it says in verse 16, "They went with haste." They went with haste.

  26:50-26:58

  And for you, seek Jesus with everything that's in you and you'll find eternal life.

  27:00-27:05

  But that's something that's true about people who find Jesus as they actively went after Him.

  27:07-27:11

  And finally for today, what's true about people who find Jesus?

  27:13-27:14

  They are never the same.

  27:16-27:18

  They are never the same.

  27:20-27:22

  This is such a funny story to me.

  27:24-27:31

  Could you imagine ladies who have children, could you imagine if you think back to that moment when you delivered that baby?

  27:32-27:36

  Could you imagine a group of complete strangers busting into the delivery room?

  27:38-27:59

  Like, "Hey, we're here to see the baby." Like, "I'm sorry, who are you?" "Oh, we're shepherds, and an angel told us you was having a baby, so we thought it appropriate to be here for that." Like, "I'm sorry, can you wait in the waiting room?" Like, this is when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.

  28:01-28:10

  And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them." They probably had a hard time talking about anything else from that point on, didn't they?

  28:12-28:37

  Like, "Hey, you remember that night the angels told us about the baby, you remember that?" Like, "Yeah, we just talked about that." "Yeah, we're gonna talk about it again, 'cause that was awesome." It says, "But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart." And the shepherds returned, back to work, the shepherds returned, back to work but never the same.

  28:37-28:38

  Did you see the rest of it?

  28:38-28:51

  It says, "Glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them." That's true of every finder of Jesus Christ without exception.

  28:51-29:18

  Every single person finds Jesus Christ is never ever ever ever the same. Now these shepherds they didn't become apostles. I don't think they became pastors, but they do get the distinction of being the first New Testament missionaries of Jesus Christ.

  29:19-29:30

  And just like seeking Jesus, they didn't need to talk into witnessing about what they saw either, did they?

  29:31-29:40

  Jesus' impact on them, this is the crazy thing, even as a baby, Jesus had an impact that changed their lives.

  29:42-29:46

  So please look, I love, I love all the Christmas tradition.

  29:46-29:47

  I really do.

  29:50-29:59

  But my encouragement for you is to not just make that the thing, because it's so much more than that.

  30:01-30:10

  And with the story, I would encourage you to not reduce this story to just sentimentality.

  30:12-30:15

  Because honestly, that's what a lot of people want to do with the Christmas story.

  30:16-30:20

  They want to make it a lifetime made-for-TV movie, right?

  30:21-30:24

  But it's heartwarming stories, some of them.

  30:25-30:42

  But it's a heartwarming story of, "Oh, this poor pregnant woman, she had to travel, and there was no room, and she gave birth in the barn, and everything was fine." Roll credits, sad music.

  30:43-30:51

  That's sort of what we make the Christmas story, like this young Jewish couple that persevered and overcame the odds.

  30:54-31:02

  And I would say, yeah, that's the story, but that's a teeny tiny part of the story because here's the real story.

  31:02-31:06

  A baby came into the world who will completely change your life.

  31:08-31:09

  So did you find Jesus?

  31:11-31:18

  Because the Bible tells us some things that are true of people who have.

  31:19-31:20

  First of all, they made room for Him.

  31:22-31:24

  Secondly, they actively went after Him.

  31:25-31:28

  And thirdly, by God's grace, they are never the same.

  31:29-31:30

  Let's pray.

  31:31-31:35

  Father in heaven, I thank you for this story.

  31:36-31:44

  And it can become so familiar that we sort of tune out when we hear it, because we've heard it so many times.

  31:46-31:48

  We hear it in church, they even share this story on the TV.

  31:51-32:09

  But God, grip us again with the wonder of the humility that you've shown, and the way that you were born, and the humility that you've shown, and reaching out to the outcasts of society to tell them the news.

  32:10-32:25

  Father, I pray for us as our schedules are full, and our lives are full with wonderful things, with family stuff, and with traveling, and so many great things happen this time of year.

  32:25-32:33

  But Father, I pray that we don't get so caught up in these things that we miss the pearl of great price.

  32:35-32:51

  Father, it's my prayer that You would use these things in such a way that we might exalt You, we might tell others about You, like the shepherds, we might glorify Your name at the announcement of this baby.

  32:52-32:54

  We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Luke 2:1-20

1. What distractions keep you from seeking Christ as you should?

2. What is the biggest way Jesus changed you when you found Him?

3. What was your big "take-away" from this passage / message? What did you learn that you didn't know before?

Breakout Questions:

Pray for one another to continually be seekers of Christ. 

His Name

Jeff gives a brief and powerful message on the importance of your given name. He explains how Jesus' birth name means so much more than we can even believe!

Matthew 1:18-25

• Audio Transcript

  01:13-01:17

  Matthew 1, we're going to be picking up a very familiar story.

  01:19-01:29

  Verse 18, Matthew writes, "Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.

  01:30-01:40

  When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they had come together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.

  01:42-01:51

  and her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

  01:53-02:07

  "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.

  02:09-02:29

  "You 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.

  02:30-02:39

  "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel," This means God with us.

  02:40-02:44

  "When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him.

  02:44-02:50

  He took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son.

  02:52-02:59

  And he called his name Jesus." I want you to think for a second.

  03:02-03:03

  How did you get your name?

  03:04-03:04

  Do you know?

  03:06-03:08

  Did you ever have that talk with whoever named you?

  03:10-03:11

  Like, why did you decide on this name?

  03:11-03:13

  Do you know why you have the name that you do?

  03:16-03:19

  Well, a name means something.

  03:21-03:22

  Even if it's random.

  03:24-03:28

  I picked that name because there was an actor that had that name and I thought it sounded nice.

  03:30-03:31

  Even if it's accidental.

  03:33-03:36

  I've known people that received their names by accident.

  03:39-03:40

  Even if it's arbitrary.

  03:41-03:42

  Like, no reason.

  03:43-03:44

  Just thought it would sound good.

  03:47-03:53

  So whatever the case is, your name has definitely come to mean something.

  03:56-03:58

  You know, God is all about naming things.

  03:58-03:59

  Did you know that?

  04:00-04:04

  In fact, when you read in the Bible Genesis, when He created man.

  04:05-04:07

  The first job that He gave man was to what?

  04:09-04:10

  Name all of the animals.

  04:13-04:15

  Hasn't really changed, has it?

  04:15-04:17

  We love to name things even today, don't we?

  04:18-04:21

  We name our kids, and we get to name our pets.

  04:22-04:24

  Some of us name our cars.

  04:25-04:27

  Some of us actually name our biceps, right?

  04:28-04:31

  To intimidate people, we say this is truth and justice.

  04:32-04:33

  Right?

  04:33-04:35

  This is law.

  04:37-04:38

  This is order.

  04:39-04:43

  Right now, some of you are thinking, no Jeff, that's more like Bert and Ernie, right?

  04:45-04:47

  But we love to name things, don't we?

  04:47-04:49

  Because a name means something.

  04:51-04:53

  Did you know that God has a name?

  04:53-04:54

  Did you know that?

  04:54-04:55

  And you're like, yeah, it's God.

  04:57-04:58

  Technically, it's not.

  04:59-05:04

  You see, technically, if we're going to get technical, God is more of a title.

  05:06-05:12

  In fact, in the Hebrew, in the Old Testament, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

  05:12-05:20

  The Hebrew literally is "Elohim Barah," and that name "Elohim" means the power, or the Almighty.

  05:22-05:34

  And yes, when we say "God," we say it reverently, And really, it's the title that means "the Almighty." Even when we say "Lord," "Adonai," that's also a title.

  05:35-05:45

  Technically, God's name, as we would spell it, is YHWH.

  05:47-05:49

  What's called the Tetragrammaton.

  05:50-06:02

  four letters, and it finds its source in Exodus chapter 3, when Moses said to God, "Well, who should I tell them sent me?" And you remember his answer.

  06:03-06:14

  He says, "I am who I am." In fact, the Hebrews would consider this name too holy to even speak.

  06:15-06:17

  They would write it, but they wouldn't even say it.

  06:17-06:26

  Even scholars today have said, "We're not even quite sure how to pronounce it, because the Hebrews wouldn't pronounce it." It's too holy to say.

  06:27-06:31

  And that brings us back to the point that a name means something.

  06:32-06:32

  Doesn't it?

  06:33-06:34

  A name means something.

  06:35-06:36

  We call people names.

  06:38-06:44

  We call people names for good and for bad.

  06:47-06:55

  meaning if somebody does a great job playing a game or something, we might say, "Hey, great job, superstar.

  06:55-07:05

  That name makes you feel pretty good, doesn't it?" Or for bad, you hand your friend something and they drop it.

  07:07-07:11

  "Nice hands, genius." Didn't quite mean it for good.

  07:13-07:15

  And they mean something, we get offended.

  07:17-07:19

  We get offended if somebody uses the wrong name, don't we?

  07:22-07:25

  I remember my moment to shine in my high school yearbook.

  07:27-07:30

  You know how they have the candid shots and they have the names on the side, you know what I'm talking about?

  07:31-07:33

  And, well I went to a very small high school.

  07:34-07:37

  Okay, it was very small, it was like the size of two phone booths put together.

  07:37-07:39

  It was a small high school.

  07:39-07:43

  everybody knew everybody. It wasn't just like everybody knew everybody.

  07:43-07:48

  Everybody knew everybody else's family and life history and everything.

  07:49-07:57

  My point is whoever was working on the yearbook, I've gotten over it, it's been a while, but whoever was working on the yearbook absolutely 100% knew who I was.

  07:59-08:11

  But when the yearbook came out, there it was, my picture, and beside it, it said It said Jill Miller. Do I look like a Jill?

  08:13-08:17

  I was a little offended. Because a name means something, right?

  08:19-08:21

  We get offended if somebody uses the wrong name.

  08:21-08:25

  We also get offended if somebody doesn't use a name at all.

  08:28-08:29

  I mean, just imagine with me.

  08:30-08:34

  Imagine we have a guest with us tonight, and they stop by to say hi in the lobby.

  08:34-08:38

  And let's just say it's a lady that's wearing red pants.

  08:39-08:43

  And as you're leaving the lobby, I'm introducing this guest to some of you.

  08:43-08:59

  And I'm like, "Hey, have you met Miss Red Pants here?" "Yeah, Miss Red Pants says this is her first time here." "And where'd you say you're from, Miss Red Pants? How long have you lived there, Miss Red Pants?" "How many times do you think I'm going to say that before she says, 'My name is Jill'?" Right?

  09:00-09:02

  And I'm gonna be like, oh, what a coincidence.

  09:02-09:05

  According to my high school yearbook, me too.

  09:06-09:07

  Don't you see the point?

  09:08-09:09

  Names are important.

  09:10-09:11

  Names are important.

  09:11-09:18

  In fact, when God was giving the commandments, did you know the third commandment, God says, "Don't misuse my name.

  09:19-09:24

  "Don't take my name in vain." Meaning, use my name in an empty way.

  09:24-09:25

  Like it doesn't mean anything.

  09:27-09:30

  God says, "Don't do that." Because my name means something.

  09:33-09:43

  So, in this account that we read in Matthew, God is going to come to the earth in the most amazing way possible.

  09:45-10:03

  But you think about it, if God were going to come to the earth, the Almighty, the Powerful One was going to come to the earth, I don't know, I would sort of expect it would be an entrance like the heavens open up There's lightning and flashes of just brilliant light.

  10:03-10:15

  And He comes with much thunder and fanfare, and every single person on the planet is forced to stop what they're doing and look at Him, because the Creator and the Holy One is here!

  10:16-10:17

  So stop what you're doing!

  10:18-10:20

  That's how I'd expect Him to show up.

  10:22-10:25

  Notice God doesn't often do things the way we expect.

  10:25-10:36

  he comes to the earth is in the most humble and regular way possible a person can come to the earth. He came as a baby.

  10:38-11:21

  So when the announcement is given that he's coming, when the angel in this passage gives Joseph the news, you can be sure that God wasn't going to roll the dice on what his name was going to be I mean could you imagine if the Lord was like you'll give birth to a son and he's gonna save his people from our sins and you know best of luck to you and Joseph and Mary are trying to come up with a name and Joseph's like you know what Old Testament name I really like is Melchizedek let's call him Melchizedek and like in 2016 we would be getting up and worshipping the name of Melchizedek.

  11:24-11:26

  So God wasn't going to roll the dice on this.

  11:26-11:30

  He says, "No, here is what you're going to call him." Did you see that in verse 21?

  11:30-11:46

  "She will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus." It's actually the name Yeshua or Joshua, which literally means Jehovah shall save.

  11:48-11:57

  Notice he goes on in verse 21, "For He will save His people." So, He's coming, and He's coming to save.

  11:57-11:59

  So this is a rescue mission.

  11:59-12:01

  This is the purpose for which He came is to rescue.

  12:02-12:03

  Will save from what?

  12:03-12:12

  And it says, "He will save His people from their sins." This is the reason that Jesus came.

  12:14-12:20

  The Bible says it's to save His people from our sins.

  12:21-12:24

  Now the word for sins in the Greek is the word hamartia.

  12:25-12:29

  And it means, literally, it means missing the mark.

  12:30-12:33

  Now when people hear that, missing the mark, they think it means something like this.

  12:33-12:44

  Like, okay, I'm an archer, and there's a target, and I'm going to try to aim at the target, and my aim was just a little off, so I didn't quite hit the center.

  12:44-12:45

  I missed the mark.

  12:45-12:55

  And some people think that that's what the mark means, like, "Oh, you know what? I really tried, I really tried, but I didn't quite hit it." That's actually not what it means at all.

  12:56-13:04

  It would mean you have your bow and arrow, and you have the target, and you decide to aim somewhere else.

  13:05-13:19

  You intentionally - not accidentally - you intentionally miss the mark, meaning this, when God gave His law, He said, "This is how to live.

  13:19-13:21

  This is how I designed your life on the earth.

  13:21-13:23

  This is how I want you to act.

  13:23-13:46

  This is the kind of people I want you to be." And we, the created mankind, we have repeatedly said, "No." God says, "I want you to be people who always tell the truth." And we say, "No. There's times that telling a lie is going to suit me better." God says, "I want you to honor your parents." And we say, "No, because my parents are dumb and always know better.

  13:47-13:48

  And we tell God no.

  13:49-13:54

  God says, "I want you to love others the way you want them to love you.

  13:54-13:57

  I want you to treat others the way you want them to treat you." And we say no!

  13:58-13:59

  They don't deserve it!

  14:01-14:02

  That's sin.

  14:04-14:15

  When the Holy One, the Creator, says to His created, "This is the deal," and His created says, "No, you don't tell me what to do!" and we intentionally miss the mark.

  14:16-14:18

  We have to ask ourselves what are His options?

  14:20-14:21

  What are God's options at this point?

  14:22-14:25

  Some would say, well, maybe His option is just to ignore, right?

  14:25-14:31

  Like sometimes parents are like, "Don't do that!" And then the kids do that, and the parents are like, "What can you do, kids?" And we just ignore it.

  14:31-14:36

  Well, God is unable to do that because of His holiness.

  14:38-14:41

  He can't just overlook flagrant rebellion.

  14:44-14:45

  What are his options?

  14:45-14:49

  Another option is he could punish us as we would deserve.

  14:51-14:53

  The other truth is that he loves us.

  14:55-14:58

  So he can't ignore us, and he doesn't want to punish us.

  14:58-15:01

  He has a third option, and that is right here.

  15:01-15:02

  It's to save us.

  15:04-15:05

  It's to rescue us.

  15:06-15:17

  It's to come into this world himself as a man, as a man, bear the wrath of God on himself on our behalf.

  15:18-15:28

  The thing that he accomplished 33 years after this moment that's talked about here, when he took the penalty of our sin on the cross.

  15:29-15:34

  Right now somebody's thinking, "Wait, wait, wait, I thought this was a Christmas service.

  15:34-15:37

  This sounds a lot like Easter." But here's the reality, church.

  15:38-15:40

  We can't separate Christmas from Easter.

  15:41-15:43

  I think people like the Christmas message in general.

  15:43-15:58

  I think people like the Christmas message better because we've sort of reduced the Christmas message to, "Oh, here's this sweet little Jewish couple, "and oh, she's so pregnant, and oh, they had to travel, "and oh, there's no room at the inn, "and she had the baby in a manger."

  15:59-15:59

  (sighs)

  16:00-16:03

  Wasn't that a Hallmark movie waiting to be filmed?

  16:04-16:07

  And we're sort of comfortable with that.

  16:08-16:16

  When the reality is the reason He came was ultimately fulfilled 33 years after that event.

  16:18-16:41

  He was nailed to a cross to fulfill this mission right here, "For He will save His people from their sins." You know, as God is poised to pour out His wrath on sin in steps Jesus Christ to bear that penalty.

  16:42-16:51

  And there's a sense in which literally God is saving you from Himself because of Jesus Christ.

  16:54-17:01

  And even when some people hear the message about salvation, I think sometimes people think of salvation just as the ticket to heaven, right?

  17:02-17:03

  You don't want to go to hell, do you?

  17:03-17:05

  Well, no, of course I don't want to go to hell.

  17:05-17:07

  Well, believe in Jesus and you'll go to heaven.

  17:09-17:14

  And understand that the mission of saving people from sin is so much more than that.

  17:14-17:18

  It actually has a past, a present, and a future aspect.

  17:21-17:25

  The past aspect - Jesus saved us from the penalty of sin.

  17:26-17:37

  Yet while I deserve and you deserve to be punished by God for all of the wrong things that we've done, Jesus saved us from the penalty that in Christ we are pronounced not guilty.

  17:39-17:40

  Saved from the penalty.

  17:41-17:43

  Some people want to stop there.

  17:43-17:44

  Like, yeah, that's all I want.

  17:44-17:47

  I just don't want to pay for the wrong things that I've done.

  17:47-17:55

  But you see, the reality is the person that's truly saved, the person that's born again, receiving His Spirit, there's another aspect of salvation.

  17:55-17:59

  He saves us from the power of sin.

  18:02-18:09

  His Holy Spirit gives us the power to say yes to God and to say no to sin.

  18:09-18:11

  A power that we wouldn't have on our own.

  18:11-18:19

  So not only are we saved from the penalty, today, right now, we are being saved from the power, but it also has a future aspect.

  18:20-18:20

  Salvation.

  18:22-18:25

  Someday He will save us from the presence of sin.

  18:27-18:33

  The day is coming when sin everything of the past.

  18:34-18:37

  The Bible is so clear in heaven, there is no sin.

  18:38-18:39

  There's no wrongdoing.

  18:39-18:41

  There's no hurt of any kind.

  18:42-18:50

  So when the Bible says He will save His people from their sins, don't just look at it as your passport has been stamped for heaven.

  18:52-18:53

  It's so much more than that.

  18:54-18:59

  Saved from the penalty, being saved from the power, and you will be saved from the presence.

  19:01-19:04

  This salvation doesn't just come from anyone.

  19:06-19:08

  You have to see that it's centered around a name.

  19:10-19:17

  My encouragement to you this Christmas, don't keep it generic.

  19:19-19:20

  Don't keep it generic.

  19:21-19:27

  We say things like, "Well, we're just going to celebrate and spread some Christmas cheer." Like, what does that even mean?

  19:29-19:47

  Or, you know, "We would like to wish you some good family tidings." Or, "Isn't it just a season of heavenly peace?" I want to encourage you to take that name, the name that's given here, the name by which we must be saved.

  19:47-19:51

  I want you to celebrate the name, Jesus.

  19:51-19:52

  I'm going to give you an opportunity.

  19:52-19:55

  I want you to say that name.

  19:56-19:57

  Are you ready?

  19:58-20:02

  Say Jesus. Say it again.

  20:04-20:12

  Jesus, the name of the one who saves His people from their sins.

  20:15-20:17

  We're going to get really specific.

  20:18-20:23

  We're going to celebrate how He saved His people from their sins.

  20:25-20:27

  I'm going to receive the Lord's Supper.

  20:29-20:30

  Will you bow with me in prayer?

  20:31-20:39

  Father in Heaven, we are so familiar with this story as we just prayed before the service.

  20:39-20:44

  We get so familiar that it sort of loses the impact over time.

  20:46-20:53

  And I pray, God, that You would with the reality in a fresh way.

  20:55-21:02

  That you came to save your people from our sins.

  21:04-21:10

  You came to accomplish for us the thing that we couldn't accomplish on our own.

  21:12-21:19

  And you chose to do it by fully embracing humanity.

  21:21-21:29

  That Jesus didn't just step out of heaven and onto the cross for a few minutes and then go back to heaven.

  21:30-21:49

  That you would actually start life in the womb to be born in a way that we can't even understand grow and develop and mature as a human, but to still fully be God at the same time.

  21:52-21:59

  Father, we gather around Your table now to reflect on the reason that You came.

  22:02-22:07

  While we were yet sinners, You died on our behalf.

  22:08-22:13

  You took the wrath, You took the penalty, and took the judgment that we deserve.

  22:14-22:15

  We stepped in.

  22:17-22:29

  So Father, I pray in the midst of all of the other distractions and thoughts and plans and even now the itineraries that are running through our heads over what's going to happen in the next couple of days, I pray Father, it would all be cleared off.

  22:30-22:34

  Right now, we would focus on one thing only.

  22:36-22:43

  The sacrifice of Jesus Christ, represented through communion.

  22:44-22:54

  We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Incomparably Gracious.

1. God is Incomparably Gracious...


2. ...and His Grace is displayed in Jesus. (Is 53:1-12)



Three Amazing Things About the Grace of Jesus:

1. His grace isn't based on our Conduct. (Is 53:1-3)


2. His grace takes away our Sin. (Is 53:4-9)


3. His grace is Unchanging and Never-Ending. (Is 53:10-12)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:15

  You know, last year about this time I had gone to the doctor and you know how the physician's assistant comes in before the doctor comes in and asks you the questions, the general health questions.

  00:15-00:28

  And on this particular day the physician's assistant came in and went through the questions and part way down the list she said, "Do you smoke?" And I said, no, I don't smoke.

  00:30-00:30

  She looked at me.

  00:32-00:36

  She said, have you ever smoked?

  00:38-00:38

  I panicked.

  00:40-00:41

  I said, yes.

  00:42-00:44

  I had a cigar several years ago.

  00:47-00:47

  Just one.

  00:47-00:49

  I said, I haven't had one since.

  00:50-00:53

  And my next scheduled cigar is never.

  00:55-00:56

  She's like, OK.

  00:59-01:04

  And after my doctor appointment, I left and was looking at the paperwork they gave me.

  01:05-01:08

  And on the papers, it said, smoker.

  01:11-01:13

  There must be some mistake here.

  01:13-01:15

  So I called up and I explained.

  01:15-01:17

  I said, look, here's what happened.

  01:17-01:19

  And the lady at the front desk, she laughed.

  01:19-01:20

  She goes, you're not a smoker.

  01:21-01:23

  I promise I'll never do it again.

  01:23-01:24

  I won't do it again.

  01:24-01:25

  She goes, "You're not a smoker.

  01:26-01:28

  We're just going to take that off the chart.

  01:28-01:29

  I'm sorry about that.

  01:29-01:33

  That must have been a misunderstanding." I was thinking about that this week.

  01:34-01:39

  You know, it doesn't work that way with sin when it comes to God.

  01:41-01:43

  Because I've sinned, have you?

  01:44-01:51

  Wouldn't it be nice to say, "You know what, I'd just like you to strike that from my record.

  01:52-01:56

  I sinned once a few years ago, and I have no intention of sinning again.

  01:57-02:00

  So I'm not a sinner, so just take that off my record.

  02:02-02:03

  It doesn't work that way.

  02:03-02:10

  Because God is holy and just, and if I've sinned one time, that makes me a sinner.

  02:13-02:19

  And the truth of the matter is, even if I say today, you know what, I'm never going to sin again, That's going to happen.

  02:22-02:25

  So I have a problem and so do you.

  02:27-02:31

  Some would say, well, it looks like God has a dilemma because we've been going through this series.

  02:32-02:33

  God is incomparable.

  02:33-02:35

  We've seen that nothing is like the Lord.

  02:36-02:46

  As we've been walking through Isaiah, we've seen that God is holy, and that God is just, and that God is awesome, and that God is loving, and that God is sovereign.

  02:47-02:48

  Comparably, all of those things.

  02:50-02:57

  The truth is, church, these attributes of God alone are not good news for sinners.

  02:59-03:02

  Because we still have a problem of guilt.

  03:04-03:10

  I mean, yeah, we know that God's loving, but God's also just.

  03:11-03:18

  So how can God love us and satisfy His justice We have this sin problem.

  03:20-03:34

  Well, with all these attributes we've discussed - holy, just, awesome, loving, sovereign - today we have the pleasure of looking at what is in my opinion probably the most amazing thing about God.

  03:34-03:40

  With everything we've talked about these past five or six weeks, this is the most amazing thing about God.

  03:41-03:42

  It's His greatness.

  03:44-03:48

  We're going to look at one of the most in the entire Bible.

  03:48-03:50

  I want you to turn with me to Isaiah 53.

  03:52-04:02

  Isaiah speaks of God's grace as He prophesies about the Messiah, the coming Christ who we know is Jesus of Nazareth.

  04:03-04:08

  Isaiah prophesies about the coming Christ dying for His people's sins.

  04:08-04:15

  This was written somewhere around 650-700 years before Jesus suffered.

  04:15-04:18

  I understand this is going to be a little bit of a different Easter message.

  04:20-04:21

  We've done it years past.

  04:21-04:27

  We've gone to the empty tomb and we've talked about what happened in those events as Jesus walked the earth.

  04:28-04:39

  But this passage is actually a flashback, a prophecy that's describing in perfect detail not only what Jesus Christ did, but what it means.

  04:41-04:44

  Interestingly, this is a very troubling passage of the Jews.

  04:45-04:54

  You know that when religious Jews in their synagogues read their Scriptures, they skip Isaiah chapter 53.

  04:55-04:59

  They read through, they read Isaiah 52, and then they jump to Isaiah 54.

  05:00-05:01

  Why do they skip that?

  05:02-05:19

  Because it's unthinkable for them that the Messiah that's promised in the Old Testament, the eventual King who's going to rule over all the world, It's unthinkable that this king would suffer as described in this passage in their Scriptures.

  05:21-05:24

  And that's called making the Bible say what you want it to say.

  05:25-05:28

  That's called making Jesus out to be what you want Him to be.

  05:28-05:31

  That's making your own God, and that's idolatry.

  05:32-05:41

  You see, Israel didn't want a Savior for the same reason that many people today They don't want a Savior.

  05:43-05:44

  It's just simply this.

  05:45-05:46

  They don't think they need one.

  05:47-05:54

  The people that don't receive the grace of God through Jesus Christ are the people that in their estimation don't need a Savior.

  05:54-05:55

  They're not that bad.

  05:56-05:59

  It's offensive to suggest that you need one.

  06:01-06:06

  It's offensive to suggest - and we live in a day that everybody's offended about everything, have you noticed?

  06:06-06:08

  Imagine this statement today.

  06:09-06:11

  You are a rebellious, rotten-to-the-core sinner.

  06:12-06:14

  You deserve hell and you can't save yourself.

  06:16-06:18

  And not much has really changed like Israel.

  06:19-06:22

  We've just sort of redefined what the Bible says about Jesus.

  06:22-06:25

  You see, some people want to make Jesus out to be a sacrament.

  06:26-06:28

  Jesus is a religious duty.

  06:29-06:39

  Whether it's going to church or lighting a candle or praying this or going through the religious motions, I want Jesus out to be sort of a sacrament.

  06:39-06:42

  I feel better because I've performed a religious duty.

  06:43-06:45

  That's all Jesus is to some people.

  06:46-06:48

  Some people make Jesus out to be a superhero.

  06:49-06:52

  They're only interested in Him when they're in trouble, right?

  06:53-06:57

  I mean, let's be honest, nobody really wants Superman around when everything's going well.

  06:58-06:59

  He's kind of boring.

  07:00-07:06

  But you know, the minute you're in that burning building, that bad guy has the gun pointed at you.

  07:06-07:09

  That's when you want Superman to show up and do his thing.

  07:09-07:11

  And that's how some people look at Jesus.

  07:11-07:23

  No regard, no thought, no mind towards Him whatsoever, but as soon as we get this diagnosis or we have this financial problem, it's Jesus swoop in and rescue!

  07:24-07:27

  And some people make Jesus out to be a superhero.

  07:29-07:31

  And some people just make Jesus out to be a story.

  07:32-07:33

  He's just a story.

  07:34-07:35

  He doesn't really have relevance for today.

  07:36-07:37

  He's just a man from history.

  07:37-07:47

  And we go to church and we talk about this man that lived a couple thousand years ago, this good Jewish man, and it's a shame what they did to him.

  07:49-07:50

  He's just this story.

  07:52-07:57

  The truth of God's Word - He's not a sacrament, He's not a superhero, and He's not a story.

  07:57-07:58

  He is a Savior.

  07:59-08:02

  Jesus Christ came to save you from your sin.

  08:04-08:09

  Number one on your outline - God is incomparably gracious.

  08:11-08:16

  Before we look at the text, I want to remind you what this term means.

  08:16-08:17

  Grace. How do we define grace?

  08:19-08:23

  In a lot of ways, it's described as unmerited favor - a gift from God.

  08:25-08:28

  The best definition of grace I've ever heard is this.

  08:29-08:32

  Grace is God giving to us what He requires from us.

  08:32-08:33

  That's grace.

  08:33-08:37

  God giving to us what He requires from us.

  08:37-08:39

  What does God require from me?

  08:39-08:46

  He requires me to be holy, perfectly righteous, unblemished.

  08:47-08:49

  God requires me to be perfect.

  08:49-08:52

  And I am so far from that.

  08:55-08:56

  But God requires that.

  08:56-09:01

  You see, in His grace, He gives to me what He requires from me.

  09:03-09:05

  It can't be earned. It can't be bartered for.

  09:05-09:09

  It won't be deserved.

  09:10-09:12

  Grace can only be received.

  09:14-09:19

  Another way I like to think of grace is just through this little story.

  09:19-09:21

  Just imagine you have a 15-year-old son.

  09:23-09:32

  Some of you do, but just imagine if you don't, let's pretend you have a 15-year-old son He goes to a party with some other students his age.

  09:33-09:42

  And another boy at this school premeditated attacks and murders your son.

  09:44-09:51

  Now if you track that murderer down and killed him yourself, that's called vengeance.

  09:52-09:59

  If you help the police apprehend this murderer He goes to trial and gets a sentence.

  10:00-10:01

  That's called justice.

  10:03-10:15

  If somehow this murderer is in court and you somehow convince the judge to drop all charges and just let him walk out the door, that's called mercy.

  10:16-10:27

  But, if you take this murderer into your home, and you raise him as your own child, That's called grace.

  10:28-10:33

  And that's exactly what God has given to us.

  10:34-10:36

  God is incomparably gracious.

  10:36-10:37

  Let's get to the text.

  10:38-10:43

  Number two in your outline, His grace is displayed in Jesus.

  10:44-10:45

  His grace is displayed in Jesus.

  10:46-10:50

  Today I want to share with you three amazing things about the grace of Jesus.

  10:52-11:08

  Number one is this - Now, before we look at the text, I could literally preach a couple dozen sermons from this passage we're looking at today, but I want us to look at the big picture.

  11:09-11:18

  But understand the way that this is written, the Bible says at the end of history, at the end of days, there's going to be this mass revival in Israel.

  11:19-11:20

  The Bible talks all about that.

  11:20-11:26

  You see Ezekiel 36, you see it in Zechariah 12, 13, 14.

  11:26-11:29

  There's going to be this mass revival in Israel.

  11:29-11:39

  And this passage is told from the perspective of Jews in the last days who come to Christ and look back saying, how did we miss Him before?

  11:42-11:46

  Look at v. 1. It says, "Who has believed what He heard from us?

  11:46-11:49

  And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

  11:50-11:59

  For He grew up before Him like a young plant like a root out of dry ground." What does that mean?

  12:00-12:01

  It just means He was insignificant.

  12:03-12:12

  I was walking around my yard the other day and I saw randomly little plants, little trees or shrubs or something, I don't know what it was, just growing up in the middle of - it was insignificant.

  12:12-12:13

  And that's the point here.

  12:15-12:19

  He just kind of grew up among us insignificant.

  12:20-12:28

  He says He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him.

  12:30-12:41

  He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised and we esteemed Him not.

  12:43-12:47

  Interestingly, this is the only description of Jesus' appearance in the Bible.

  12:47-12:48

  Did you know that?

  12:49-12:51

  The only description of Jesus' appearance.

  12:51-13:00

  In our day, we're so fascinated and we're so enthralled with appearance and supermodels and good-looking athletes and appearance is everything to us.

  13:01-13:06

  The Bible only gives us this description of Jesus' appearance.

  13:06-13:09

  And all it says is there was nothing special about it.

  13:09-13:24

  I think sometimes we think that Jesus was like seven feet tall and He had perfect chiseled features and He had the beautiful long flowing hair and highlights, and you could just see Jesus from across a football field and be like, "That's Him right there!

  13:24-13:31

  Look at Him! He's gorgeous!" And the Bible says no, He didn't have anything special about His appearance.

  13:32-13:36

  You couldn't have picked Him out of a group of Jewish men His age.

  13:37-13:41

  In fact, when Judas betrayed Him, do you remember in the garden Judas said, "I'm going to kiss the one"?

  13:41-13:43

  Why did Judas have to do that?

  13:44-13:50

  He had to identify Jesus from all the other Jewish men Because you couldn't tell Jesus just by looking at Him.

  13:50-13:52

  That's what Isaiah prophesied here.

  13:53-13:54

  Nothing special about the way He looked.

  13:56-13:58

  He just looked like a Jewish man.

  14:00-14:08

  And the prophecy - as Israel's looking back, as we look back, we say, you know, the time we considered Jesus to be insignificant.

  14:09-14:22

  And this is the first manifestation of grace that we see in this passage because Jesus, the God of Israel, He came to Israel and was rejected by His own people.

  14:24-14:25

  Rejected by His own people.

  14:26-14:33

  We can't gloss over this because how many people here have ever - can you think of a time that you felt rejected by people?

  14:33-14:38

  Can you think of a time - raise your hand - if you've ever felt like I've been rejected for whatever reason?

  14:40-14:42

  We don't handle that well, do we?

  14:43-14:45

  I'm sure you handle that much better than I do.

  14:49-14:53

  When we're rejected, we get bitter, we get hateful.

  14:54-15:00

  But when you've been rejected, we don't often react with grace, do we?

  15:01-15:05

  Years ago, Aaron and I did this wedding for this couple.

  15:06-15:11

  And when I do a wedding, it's not just show up, do the wedding, 25 minutes and see you later.

  15:12-15:20

  We're talking about months and months of premarital counseling, and planning the service, and getting them equipped, getting everything ready for this wedding.

  15:21-15:27

  And normally it's customary that after the wedding, there's the wedding reception.

  15:27-15:30

  And a lot of times people say I want you to pray for the meal, etc.

  15:31-15:38

  So we had the wedding at the church, and we went down to where they were having the wedding reception.

  15:39-15:41

  And Aaron and I walked in.

  15:42-16:11

  how they have those little folded pieces of paper on the table that has your name and tells you what table you're sitting you know the thing I'm talking about so Aaron and I are looking what table are we at what table we at what table we at you see our card Aaron's like no I don't see it okay it's in here somewhere we we were not on the guest list so we said hey we're all gussied up let's just go to dinner so we said of going someplace else for dinner.

  16:11-16:17

  And when we came out, I realized that I had the couple's marriage license still in the car.

  16:18-16:25

  I thought, well, they're going to need this, so let's stop by the reception hall again, and I'll give them their marriage license.

  16:26-16:40

  At this point, the reception was a couple hours over, and I walked in, and I saw the groom, and I said, "Hey, I have your marriage license here." He looked shocked to see us.

  16:40-16:41

  He goes, "Jeff!

  16:43-16:52

  Hey, I think there's some leftovers in the back if you're hungry." And I'm like, "Leftovers?!

  16:52-17:00

  You would feed me the scraps from your table like a dog?!" I didn't say that, but I thought that.

  17:01-17:07

  I've got to tell you, I felt a little rejected this whole time, and then he comes back and give you scraps of food.

  17:08-17:13

  And at the time I was thinking there's no way that I'm going to be hanging out here socializing.

  17:13-17:15

  I felt rejected.

  17:16-17:18

  It's taken me years to get over that.

  17:20-17:23

  But you see, the point is this is how Israel was to Jesus.

  17:23-17:25

  You're not really wanted here.

  17:25-17:27

  You're sort of insignificant to us.

  17:28-17:31

  And the good news here is grace isn't based on our conduct.

  17:31-17:37

  Jesus didn't show up rejected by His people and say, Well, they're not interested in Me, so guess what?

  17:37-17:38

  I'm not interested in them either.

  17:39-17:41

  I came to give them grace.

  17:41-17:43

  I came to give them life.

  17:43-17:44

  I came to point them to the Father.

  17:45-17:46

  And they don't want anything to do with Me?

  17:46-17:49

  I'm the one that they've been waiting for since creation?

  17:49-17:51

  And they don't want anything to do with Me?

  17:51-17:51

  You know what?

  17:52-17:58

  I'll just go back to heaven where I'm exalted as I should be.

  17:59-18:00

  But He didn't do that.

  18:02-18:09

  Despite the rejection, Jesus carried through with His mission of grace to the very end.

  18:10-18:11

  Why?

  18:13-18:15

  Because His grace isn't based on our conduct.

  18:17-18:24

  This is good news for you today because if you're sitting here and you've rejected Jesus in the past, you can receive Him today.

  18:25-18:26

  It's not too late.

  18:27-18:31

  Somebody might be sitting here saying, "Pastor Jeff, I've rejected Christ for decades.

  18:32-18:38

  I know about Him and I've known who He is, but I've never really received Him as my Lord and Savior.

  18:39-18:43

  And Jeff, don't you think it's a little hypocritical if I would give my life to Jesus today?

  18:43-18:44

  The answer is no.

  18:46-18:49

  Because He's still extending His grace to you today.

  18:52-18:54

  Because His grace isn't based on your conduct.

  18:56-18:58

  His grace is based on His goodness.

  19:00-19:01

  Comparable grace.

  19:02-19:02

  Letter B.

  19:04-19:08

  "Without this done, His grace takes away our sin." Pick up in verse 4.

  19:09-19:14

  It says, "Surely, He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.

  19:15-19:19

  Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

  19:22-19:26

  But He was wounded for our transgressions.

  19:28-19:29

  He was crushed.

  19:30-19:35

  For our iniquities upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace.

  19:37-19:41

  And with His stripes, we are healed.

  19:43-19:45

  All we like sheep have gone astray.

  19:46-19:49

  We have turned everyone to His own way.

  19:51-19:56

  And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

  19:57-20:04

  I think an amazing thing about the incomparable grace of God in Jesus Christ is this, His grace takes away our sin.

  20:05-20:12

  Look at verse 6, it says, "All we like sheep have gone astray." The Bible says that we are sheep.

  20:13-20:21

  I don't particularly like that description, because sheep really are the stupidest animals in the animal kingdom.

  20:21-20:22

  They are.

  20:22-20:23

  They're stupid.

  20:23-20:24

  They're weak.

  20:24-20:25

  They're defenseless.

  20:27-20:28

  Sheep are just idiots.

  20:30-20:31

  Like why can you say that?

  20:32-20:33

  How can you say that?

  20:33-20:38

  What do you call the guy that babysits the cows all day?

  20:38-20:39

  What's he called?

  20:39-20:41

  Well, there is no guy that just babysits cows all day.

  20:41-20:42

  Exactly.

  20:42-20:44

  What do you call the guy that babysits the chickens all day?

  20:45-20:48

  There really is no guy that just babysits the chickens all day.

  20:48-20:50

  Right, what do you call the guy that babysits the sheep?

  20:52-20:52

  Shepherd.

  20:53-20:58

  There's a job created to take care of the sheep all day because they're stupid.

  20:59-21:03

  Sheep are so stupid that people train dogs to take care of sheep.

  21:03-21:04

  That blows my mind.

  21:05-21:11

  My dog is the stupidest animal I've ever had the pleasure of knowing.

  21:11-21:12

  I love him to death, but he's so dumb.

  21:13-21:20

  But I look at him and I think, you know what, they take animals like you and they train them to take care of an animal that's much stupider.

  21:22-21:23

  Sheep are stupid.

  21:25-21:25

  How are they stupid?

  21:26-21:32

  Other animals have enough sense to stay with the pack, the flock, the gaggle, whatever.

  21:33-21:36

  Most animals have enough sense to stay with the group.

  21:37-21:43

  And that's why sheep are so stupid, because they just wander away and put themselves in danger.

  21:44-21:45

  And the Bible says that's you.

  21:46-21:46

  And that's me.

  21:47-21:50

  We all, like sheep, have gone astray each to his own way.

  21:50-21:52

  We're just not paying attention.

  21:52-22:02

  We're stupid in our sin, And we're just kind of wandering around and putting ourselves in danger, and we don't even realize it.

  22:04-22:06

  We are like stupid sheep that wander.

  22:06-22:12

  But notice also your Bible says, "to his own way." What does that mean?

  22:13-22:18

  That means your sin tendency and my sin tendency are going to be different.

  22:19-22:24

  Do you ever look at somebody - maybe they committed some kind of a crime or something, That's the stupidest thing I've ever seen.

  22:24-22:26

  Why would somebody do something like that?

  22:26-22:27

  That's so stupid.

  22:28-22:31

  That seems stupid to you because that's not your sin tendency.

  22:32-22:44

  I guarantee you if we brought that guy whose sin you think is so stupid, if we brought that guy and sat him down and shared your sin with him, he would look at you and say, "I can't believe you would do something like that.

  22:44-22:50

  That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard." It seems stupid to us because we have different sin tendencies.

  22:52-22:53

  That's what the Bible says here.

  22:53-22:54

  We're all like sheep.

  22:56-22:59

  We've gone away, we've turned, and we just go our own way.

  23:02-23:07

  But the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

  23:08-23:09

  This is a beautiful verse.

  23:10-23:11

  I want to share this with you again.

  23:11-23:13

  The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

  23:13-23:17

  Pretend with me for a second that this Bible is not the Bible.

  23:17-23:23

  Let's pretend instead This is a book of all of the sins I've ever committed.

  23:23-23:25

  Now, it would be a much thicker book.

  23:25-23:27

  It would be huge.

  23:27-23:29

  It would be several volumes, but we're pretending.

  23:31-23:33

  Every sin I've ever committed is in this book.

  23:33-23:35

  And let this hand represent me.

  23:36-23:40

  You see, when God sees me, He sees my sin.

  23:41-23:47

  He says, "Jeff, I see all of the wrong things that you've done." Here's the glorious thing about Jesus Christ.

  23:47-23:48

  This hand represents Jesus.

  23:49-23:53

  The Bible says the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of a son.

  23:53-24:00

  God put My sin on Jesus, so now when God sees Me, what does He see?

  24:02-24:03

  No sin.

  24:03-24:04

  Perfectly righteous.

  24:05-24:07

  How can God say that I'm perfect?

  24:07-24:09

  How can God say that I'm holy?

  24:10-24:14

  Isaiah 53:6 Because He put My sin on His Son.

  24:16-24:24

  "as laid the iniquity of us all upon Him." You see, it's not even like, "Well, we put all that sin on, but Jeff, you still have a little bit of sin left on your account." It's not that at all.

  24:24-24:28

  All of my sin on Jesus Christ.

  24:30-24:31

  Look at verse 7.

  24:32-24:33

  Because he was oppressed.

  24:33-24:34

  He was afflicted.

  24:35-24:37

  This is talking about his trial.

  24:37-24:39

  We talked about that as we went through Mark.

  24:39-24:43

  The trial of Jesus Christ is the biggest sham in history.

  24:44-24:55

  They broke every rule about court that they could break in order to expedite the execution of Jesus Christ.

  24:56-24:58

  That's what it's talking about when it says He was oppressed.

  24:58-25:01

  He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth.

  25:03-25:12

  Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, like a sheep that before its shears is silent, so He opened not His mouth.

  25:14-25:42

  you say, "Well, wait a minute. Jesus did say some things in his trial." That's not what that means. It means that he didn't defend himself. It means that he didn't fight back. He's just like we talked about sheep being weak. Jesus allowed himself to be weak. He didn't fight them. So when it says he opened out his mouth, that's what it means. Never defended himself. "By oppression and judgment," verse 8, that He was taken away.

  25:43-25:50

  And as for His generation, who considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of My people?

  25:52-25:55

  That's just saying that nobody came to Jesus' defense.

  25:55-25:57

  Nobody came alongside to help Him.

  25:58-26:00

  Nobody rightly considered what was really happening.

  26:02-26:04

  They made His grave with the wicked.

  26:06-26:09

  Jesus was crucified beside two criminals.

  26:11-26:11

  What's the next phrase?

  26:12-26:17

  "And with a rich man in his death." We're talking about Joseph of Arimathea.

  26:19-26:24

  A rich man who gave Jesus his tomb.

  26:26-26:28

  Prophesied 700 years before it happened.

  26:29-26:32

  Incredible. Absolutely incredible.

  26:34-26:42

  "Although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth." Jesus didn't do anything wrong.

  26:42-26:43

  Why didn't He defend Himself?

  26:43-26:54

  Sometimes I read through the Gospels and I see these ridiculous charges, these ridiculous accusations, and there's a little part of me that reads the Gospels and I'm like, Jesus, say something!

  26:55-26:56

  You know, defend Yourself!

  26:57-26:58

  He couldn't.

  27:00-27:04

  Jesus didn't speak up to defend Himself because He was guilty.

  27:05-27:07

  Oh, not for anything He had done.

  27:09-27:11

  Jesus was guilty for everything that I had done.

  27:12-27:14

  Jesus was guilty for everything that you had done.

  27:15-27:20

  He knew that the iniquity was going to be laid upon Him.

  27:22-27:23

  His grace takes away our sin.

  27:25-27:32

  If you're sitting here today and you've received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you never have to fear God's judgment.

  27:32-27:35

  As I said, Jesus took our sin on Himself.

  27:35-27:43

  And when He did, when Jesus was on the cross, God punished my sin as He poured out His judgment on Jesus.

  27:44-27:49

  Understand that God is not going to turn around and punish me for my sin.

  27:50-27:52

  That would mean that Jesus died for nothing.

  27:54-27:56

  Your sin has been taken away, it's been removed.

  27:57-28:00

  In Christ, your sin never again is an issue with God.

  28:02-28:06

  And some would say, "Well, what if I mess up tomorrow?" I need to point this out.

  28:06-28:10

  I've met some people that teach and preach and believe this, but it's wrong.

  28:11-28:38

  There are people that teach that, "Okay, I received Christ and I'm forgiven, but if I commit a sin, and I would die tragically in an accident, that sin that I committed came after I received Christ as my Savior, and if I didn't confess it, and it wasn't forgiven, that means I'm going to hell for that sin." It is a crazy theology. It's like this umbrella.

  28:39-28:42

  Like, "I'm under the protection of God's salvation today.

  28:42-28:44

  I mess up, I'm out from under the umbrella.

  28:44-28:46

  I better get right, I better confess.

  28:46-28:53

  I better receive forgiveness again so that I can go to heaven again." And that is wrong.

  28:55-29:02

  Keep in mind that when Jesus Christ died on the cross, when Jesus Christ rose from the dead, every single sin that you committed was still in the future.

  29:04-29:17

  So your sin, the ones you committed yesterday, the ones you committed this morning, the ones you commit tomorrow, all of them have already been paid for in advance.

  29:18-29:22

  This is the incomparable grace that takes away my sin.

  29:23-29:26

  And finally for today, look down at verse 10.

  29:27-29:28

  He jots this down.

  29:28-29:33

  His grace is unchanging and never-ending.

  29:34-29:40

  Verse 10 says, "Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him." He has put him to grief.

  29:41-29:47

  When his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring.

  29:49-29:50

  He shall prolong his days.

  29:51-29:54

  The will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.

  29:55-29:59

  I want to circle this verse in your Bible because this is talking about the resurrection.

  30:00-30:07

  You see, if this suffering servant, this suffering Christ, if He just died and stayed dead, this verse makes no sense.

  30:07-30:12

  How else would He see His offspring - His spiritual offspring?

  30:12-30:14

  How else would His days be prolonged?

  30:15-30:19

  How else could we say that He prospered if He died and stayed dead?

  30:19-30:22

  This verse is talking about the resurrection of the Messiah.

  30:25-30:26

  Look at the first part of verse 10.

  30:26-30:30

  This is, to me, one of the most incredible verses in the entire Bible.

  30:30-30:37

  It says, "Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him." Remember a few years ago when the Passion of the Christ came out?

  30:37-30:40

  And there was this big controversy.

  30:40-30:42

  It's anti-Semitic!

  30:42-30:47

  The Passion of the Christ is anti-Semitic because you're saying that the Jews killed Jesus.

  30:48-30:49

  I just kind of laughed.

  30:50-31:00

  To say it's anti-Semitic, like wait a minute, The star of the movie Jesus is Jewish, and all of His disciples depicted in the movie are all Jewish.

  31:00-31:02

  How can you say that this is an anti-Jewish film?

  31:05-31:09

  The mistake is even deeper than that because it wasn't the Jews that killed Jesus.

  31:11-31:15

  At the time, they thought it was them out of envy handing Him over to the Romans.

  31:16-31:19

  They thought they were killing Jesus, but ultimately it wasn't them.

  31:20-31:24

  And also, the Romans thought But they had a hand in it.

  31:24-31:36

  Pilate's like, "I'm washing my hands of it." It was the Roman guards that were nailing Jesus to the cross and executing Him, so there's a sense in which you could say, well, the Romans thought that they were killing Jesus.

  31:36-31:38

  And that's not right either.

  31:40-31:47

  The Bible says, verse 10, "Who killed Jesus?" It says that God the Father did.

  31:48-31:50

  Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush Him.

  31:52-32:03

  God used the Jews and the Romans, but ultimately, ultimately, it was God who gave His Son to die for my sin.

  32:03-32:11

  This is the most amazing aspect of God's grace that I can even think of now that I'm a parent.

  32:12-32:21

  Because get this, if saving you meant that I had to kill my son, That would never happen.

  32:22-32:25

  I would not sacrifice my son for anyone or anything.

  32:25-32:31

  I wouldn't sacrifice either of my kids for the 7.3 billion people on the planet.

  32:31-32:36

  If it was one of them, or all of you, I would pick them every time.

  32:37-32:38

  I'm just being honest with you.

  32:38-32:40

  Hey, I love you. You're a love.

  32:40-32:41

  I love you.

  32:43-32:44

  I'm just being honest with you.

  32:44-32:45

  I love you.

  32:47-32:49

  I would not sacrifice my son for you.

  32:51-32:52

  That's what makes God, God.

  32:55-33:01

  Because not only would He, but He did sacrifice His Son.

  33:05-33:07

  That is incomparable grace.

  33:09-33:11

  Home stretch. Look at verse 11.

  33:11-33:15

  Out of the anguish of his soul, "He shall see and be satisfied.

  33:17-33:26

  By His knowledge shall the righteous with My servant make many to be accounted righteous, and He shall bear their iniquities.

  33:27-33:47

  Therefore, I will divide Him a portion with the many, and He shall divide the spoiled with the strong, because He poured out His soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors, yet He bore the sin of many." intercession for the transgressors.

  33:49-33:50

  That's us saying a lot.

  33:52-34:00

  To paraphrase, sin defeated, mission completed, Jesus exalted, making intercession.

  34:00-34:05

  Hebrews 7.25 really sums this up.

  34:05-34:19

  It says, "Therefore, He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him - through Jesus - He always lives to make intercession for them.

  34:20-34:28

  Understand, the Bible says that the work of salvation is complete, but the care and the attention of Jesus Christ for you is not complete.

  34:28-34:31

  Grace didn't just stop at the cross.

  34:31-34:34

  You know, the Bible says Jesus right now is praying for you.

  34:36-34:37

  Jesus is praying for me.

  34:37-34:39

  Jesus is praying for you.

  34:39-34:40

  Well, what's He praying for?

  34:41-34:42

  I know one thing for sure.

  34:43-34:49

  Revelation 12.10 says that Satan is constantly accusing God's people before God.

  34:50-34:52

  Satan is constantly accusing.

  34:55-34:57

  Christ is constantly defending.

  34:59-35:01

  He's like the ultimate defense attorney.

  35:02-35:07

  You see, Satan would point at Russ and he'd be like, "Russ is no good. Russ is dirt.

  35:08-35:11

  God, I don't know why you spend any time dealing with him or his family because they're worthless.

  35:13-35:13

  They're sinners.

  35:14-35:19

  And here's Jesus Christ saying, "No, no, no. I died for Him.

  35:20-35:21

  He received me by faith.

  35:22-35:23

  He's one of mine.

  35:24-35:28

  He is perfect!" And God's like, "Case closed.

  35:28-35:35

  My son says Russ is perfect." So, Jesus is constantly interceding for His people.

  35:37-35:44

  The same incomparable grace that saves His people for the First Christ to continually intercede for us.

  35:46-35:50

  I think that right now, Jesus is praying for you.

  35:52-36:04

  He tells us that grace isn't just momentary, nor is grace just history, nor is grace just future - something that we will receive someday.

  36:04-36:11

  Grace is constant, it's unchanging, it's never-ending, is incomparable.

  36:12-36:14

  Would you bow your heads, please?

  36:16-36:21

  The reason I want you to do that is I just want you to focus individually.

  36:23-36:25

  I want you to focus on your walk with the Lord.

  36:28-36:30

  Evaluate, do I even have one?

  36:31-36:36

  Have you received this grace that God has offered in Jesus Christ?

  36:36-36:38

  Have you been trying to earn it?

  36:39-36:40

  Have you been questioning it?

  36:42-36:43

  Have you been doubting it?

  36:44-36:48

  Have you been wrestling with questions like does God really love me?

  36:49-36:51

  Is God really for me?

  36:53-36:59

  Can I really be forgiven for all of the stupid choices and mistakes that I've made?

  36:59-37:06

  All of the sin that I've committed, can I really be forgiven for these things?

  37:07-37:12

  the answer to all of these questions, finds God pointing to Jesus.

  37:13-37:20

  Finds God pointing to the cross, saying this is where your sin was punished because I put it on My Son.

  37:21-37:28

  We see God pointing to the empty tomb to say Jesus wasn't just some martyr.

  37:29-37:31

  He is alive and He is victorious.

  37:32-37:40

  And His resurrected life another aspect of my grace that He wants you to receive.

  37:41-38:09

  God points to Jesus and says, "Here is the display of My incomparable grace." Is there anyone here today who says, "Pastor Jeff, I so desperately need the grace of God in my life." Is there somebody here Maybe you made a decision to receive Christ as your Lord and Savior some time ago.

  38:11-38:16

  Maybe over time, you've started to believe a lie that you need to do things to earn this grace.

  38:16-38:22

  And that Jesus loves me more when I'm doing right things, and Jesus loves me less when I mess up.

  38:22-38:23

  And that's a lie.

  38:25-38:28

  Nothing can increase or diminish God's grace in your life.

  38:28-38:30

  It is always perfectly constant.

  38:32-38:41

  Is there somebody here today that says, you know what, I need this reminder that God's grace is not based on my performance.

  38:41-38:41

  Is there anybody here?

  38:42-38:46

  I need the reminder that God's grace is not based on my performance.

  38:47-38:51

  Father, I want to lift up those - God, You know every heart.

  38:52-38:54

  Through Your Word, God, we know Your heart.

  38:55-38:56

  You have revealed Your heart.

  38:57-39:17

  And Your heart says although we don't deserve it, You have chosen to pour out Your grace and Your love in the most mind-boggling way by allowing Your Son to die in our place.

  39:18-39:25

  I thank You, Father, for those that by faith acknowledged that before You today.

  39:27-39:34

  Whether they need to receive it today, Father, that You would reveal Yourself to them in a mighty way, and that this would be the day of salvation.

  39:34-39:46

  This would be the day that they're done trying to do it their way, and instead embrace what You've already provided through Jesus Christ.

  39:47-39:48

  I lift them up to You now, Father.

  39:50-40:27

  I pray those who have started to believe a lie, attitude towards us is based on our conduct. She would remind them today Father that you love them. You love them with an eternal love. And whether we're having the best day of our lives or the absolute worst day of our lives, it doesn't change the grace and the love that you show us. It doesn't change your and gratitude towards us because our standing with You isn't based on our conduct.

  40:27-40:30

  It's based on the work of Jesus Christ.

  40:31-40:37

  I pray that today, God, You would reaffirm the truth of Your Word in these hearts.

  40:39-41:19

  Father, we would leave here rejoicing as we've spent these past few weeks, Father, we've tried to take a glimpse We've had a peek through Isaiah at who you are, but Father, as we close this series and we celebrate, as Darren had said earlier, the most significant event in history, Father, we see that every attribute was never more simultaneously and graphically on display than they were on the cross.

  41:20-41:23

  On the cross, Father, we see that You are holy.

  41:24-41:25

  You will not tolerate sin.

  41:27-41:37

  You are so holy, and Your hatred of sin is so holy, that You will pour Your wrath on the spotless Lamb of God.

  41:39-41:42

  Father, on the cross, we see that You are just.

  41:44-41:50

  In order to satisfy Your justice, Someone had to pay the penalty.

  41:51-41:54

  You didn't just ignore it or overlook it or write it off.

  41:54-41:57

  The penalty had to be paid for your justice to be satisfied.

  41:57-42:00

  And Jesus Christ accomplished that on the cross.

  42:02-42:04

  Father on the cross, we see that You are awesome.

  42:06-42:14

  We look at the events of the cross - darkness and earthquakes and graves open and dead people alive again walking around.

  42:14-42:18

  We see your awesomeness on the cross.

  42:20-42:22

  On the cross, Father, we see that you are loving.

  42:24-42:27

  That is what motivated you to send your Son.

  42:27-42:30

  Your Word tells us that you so loved the world that you gave your Son.

  42:32-42:34

  On the cross, Father, we see your sovereignty.

  42:36-42:44

  While the religious Jews thought they were killing Jesus, and the Romans thought they were killing Jesus, It was the will of the Lord to crush Him.

  42:46-42:48

  Father, on the cross we see Your grace.

  42:49-42:50

  Your gift to us.

  42:53-42:54

  Unearned, unmerited salvation.

  42:55-42:57

  To Your glory and honor, Father.

  42:58-43:00

  May the celebration continue.

  43:02-43:04

  We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Isaiah 53:1-12

1. Why is this prophecy from Isaiah 53 important for us in understanding why Jesus died on the cross?

2. Describe how each of the attributes of God we’ve studied the past 6 weeks show up graphically and simultaneously while Jesus was on the cross. How did the cross show God’s incomparable:
   - holiness
   - justice
   - awesomeness
   - love
   - sovereignty
   - grace

3. Explain how Is 53:10 mentions the resurrection of Jesus. Why is this significant?

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.

How to Have the Best Christmas Ever, the Shepherd Way

1. LISTEN Up! Be ready to respond to God's Word. (Luke 2:8-16)

Three Levels of Belief:
• Knowing the information
• Agreeing with the information
• Acting on the information

How to Act Upon Your Faith:
• REPENT
• RECEIVE
• REACT


2. SPEAK Up! People need to hear what you know about Jesus. (Luke 2:17-18)


3. LOOK Up! Seeing God at work changes you! (Luke 2:19-20)

North Street Christian Church - Christmas Eve Service

Sermon Notes (PDF): (no notes)
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:05

  So the story was told of this man in the Wild West who ran this saloon.

  00:07-00:28

  And this cowboy comes in and he says, "I'll have a root beer, but I'm gonna need it really fast." And the saloon manager says, "Okay." And he pours him a root beer and the cowboy takes it and he chugs it and he says, "Okay, good to go. Here's the money." And the saloon manager says, "What, what, what, what, what, what's the hurry?

  00:29-00:31

  "Why are you in such a hurry?" And the cowboy says, "Didn't you hear?

  00:32-00:38

  "Big Zeke is coming!" And the saloon owner says, "Haven't heard.

  00:38-00:42

  "Who's Big Zeke?" He says, "You've never heard of Big Zeke.

  00:43-00:50

  "He is only the biggest, nastiest outlaw "anyone has ever met.

  00:51-00:57

  "They say if he doesn't like the way that you look at him, "he'll bust your jaw right off.

  00:58-00:59

  won't even think twice about.

  01:01-01:04

  He says, "But you know what, I don't have time to sit here and tell you stories about Big Zeke.

  01:04-01:06

  I'm out of here." And the cowboy left.

  01:07-01:15

  And the saloon owner just went back to his business and, sure enough, about 15 or 20 minutes later, those swinging doors kick in.

  01:17-01:19

  And in walks...

  01:19-01:21

  in walks this mountain.

  01:23-01:27

  This man was 6'7" and weighed at least 400 pounds.

  01:29-01:33

  And he was wearing a buffalo, and I don't mean wearing a buffalo skin coat.

  01:33-01:37

  He had an actual buffalo on his back wearing it.

  01:39-01:48

  He had a rattlesnake around his waist as a belt, and it wasn't even a dead rattlesnake. It was a living rattlesnake that was too scared to move.

  01:50-01:52

  He had a beard halfway down his chest.

  01:53-01:56

  He had spurs on his boots the size of dinner plates.

  01:58-02:17

  And he walks up to the saloon owner, and he says, "Give me a root beer." The saloon owner, "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, sir." And he pours, and he puts it down there, and the man grabs it.

  02:19-02:25

  One swig, and it shatters the glass with his hand, and it just explodes and he throws the pieces down.

  02:26-02:36

  And the saloon keeper says, "Can I get you another one, sir?" The man says, "I don't know what you're talking about.

  02:36-02:37

  "I gotta get going.

  02:37-02:46

  "Big Zeke's coming, haven't you heard?" You know, at Christmas, there's all this expectation.

  02:48-02:59

  But the Christmas story, there's something that's sort of lost to us because you have the nation of Israel that was expecting this Messiah to come for generations and generations and generations.

  03:00-03:06

  And unlike the big Zeke story, when we look at the Christmas story, the Messiah was there.

  03:08-03:11

  The one that they've been expecting for generations, He was there.

  03:14-03:16

  And hardly anybody knew He was there.

  03:19-03:21

  Now how in the world did that happen?

  03:24-03:26

  Didn't the Lord have a PR person?

  03:26-03:30

  Didn't the Lord have somebody that could have handled that better?

  03:31-03:33

  That God was going to become a man.

  03:34-03:39

  The most significant act in the history of the planet, true or false?

  03:40-03:40

  True.

  03:41-03:55

  God was going to become a man and live among us, And the only people that show up on the night that God shows up on the earth is a handful of shepherds.

  03:56-03:58

  How in the world did that happen?

  04:00-04:18

  We live in a day when if some celebrity sneezes, there's 20 photographers in their face, and it's all over the news, and TMZ and the E! Television Network, and, you know, is this a fatal cold this celebrity has?

  04:18-04:28

  And everybody knows about it! But how is it that God himself comes to the earth, and the only people that he bothers to tell are...

  04:30-04:39

  shepherds. No parade, no fanfare, no spectacle, no paparazzi, no red carpet.

  04:39-04:44

  but just complete humility.

  04:46-04:48

  Maybe God's just a fan of shepherds.

  04:49-05:05

  Moses was a shepherd, and Abraham was a shepherd, and David was a shepherd, and the Lord Himself, when He identifies Himself in the Old Testament, Psalm 23, verse 1, says, "The Lord is my shepherd." So maybe God's just a big fan of shepherds.

  05:07-05:21

  Maybe it's hard for us to understand in a day when Christmas comes, we're anticipating getting the new thing, and what's the bigger and better and newest technology?

  05:24-05:28

  Maybe this idea of humility has lost on us.

  05:29-05:39

  Maybe the Lord was just teaching that the child born wasn't just for the elite, It wasn't just for kings and governors and the higher-ups and the religious organization.

  05:39-05:45

  Maybe this was God's way of saying that this child born is for everyone, even common people like me.

  05:48-05:54

  So the story of the shepherds is really your story and it's my story, and it's the story of everyone who's encountered God.

  05:54-05:57

  And I want us to look at it again for just a few minutes.

  05:57-05:59

  Turn in your Bibles if you have them.

  05:59-06:01

  I hope you do, to Luke chapter 2.

  06:02-06:23

  picking up in verse 8 and the title of this message is how to have the best Christmas ever the Shepherd way I just want to give you three things that I want you to meditate upon tonight and tomorrow and through this Christmas This is the season.

  06:25-06:26

  The first one is this.

  06:27-06:28

  Listen up.

  06:29-06:32

  Be ready to respond to God's Word.

  06:33-06:34

  Let's look at this.

  06:34-06:44

  This is a familiar passage to most of us, but I want us to try to look at it as if it's the first time that we're reading it.

  06:47-06:49

  God's Word writes for us.

  06:50-06:54

  And in the same region, there were shepherds out in the field watch over their flock by night.

  06:56-07:02

  And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.

  07:02-07:10

  And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.

  07:12-07:18

  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord.

  07:19-07:21

  And this will be a sign for you.

  07:22-07:59

  "You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly hosts, praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace among those with whom He is pleased." When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, "The Lord has made known to us." And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger.

  08:01-08:02

  First of all, listen up.

  08:03-08:06

  Be ready to respond to God's Word.

  08:08-08:15

  Back in verse 7, the verse right before this passage we looked at, it says that there was no room for Jesus in the inn.

  08:16-08:18

  And that's something else that always bothered me about this story.

  08:19-08:26

  Imagine you ran an inn and this pregnant woman shows up and she's about to give birth any minute.

  08:27-08:28

  Would you turn her away?

  08:30-08:31

  I did some studying on this.

  08:33-08:40

  You know the Greek word for inn is the word kataluma, and it's used one other time in the New Testament.

  08:40-08:44

  And the only other time it's used is actually in Mark 14.

  08:44-08:55

  in verse 14, when Jesus was talking about the disciples going ahead to prepare for the Passover in this kataluma, the guest room.

  08:56-08:57

  That's where they had the Last Supper.

  08:57-08:59

  We sometimes call that the upper room.

  09:00-09:11

  And that's my understanding, this is just my understanding from the text, that when it says there was no room for them in the inn, I don't see them showing up at this hotel when this innkeeper slams the door in their face.

  09:11-09:21

  What I see is because of this census and because of the crowds coming in, that the place that they were supposed to stay, the guest room was full.

  09:21-09:24

  The catalooma, the upper guest room was full.

  09:25-09:31

  And the Bible doesn't say that they were in a barn or in a cave.

  09:32-09:40

  It simply says that Jesus was laid in a manger, So we know that he was laid in a place where they kept the animals.

  09:41-09:43

  And I studied this.

  09:44-09:52

  Many houses that had these upper rooms actually in the lower rooms or the ground floor is where they kept their animals for the night when they brought them in.

  09:52-09:54

  In other words, we would call that the garage.

  09:55-10:05

  So when I see the story of the birth of Jesus Christ, Jesus being born in the garage with the animals.

  10:08-10:10

  But a lot of funny things in this story.

  10:11-10:20

  Verse 16, "When the shepherds heard the message, it says they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger." And I don't know about you, but doesn't that strike you as funny?

  10:22-10:24

  Like, just get this scene.

  10:25-10:35

  Okay, pregnant woman about to give birth and they just traveled and there was no room where they were supposed to stay, and they end up having the baby.

  10:36-10:37

  Anybody here ever have a baby?

  10:38-10:42

  I'm not gonna go into all the details, but there's a lot of stuff that goes with having a baby.

  10:42-10:57

  So they have this baby, and they lay this baby in the feeding trough, and here's Mary and here's Joseph, and all of a sudden, this big group of strangers shows up.

  10:58-11:05

  "Well, many of you were there when my children were born, because you're my friends and I know you and I love you and it was great to see you.

  11:05-11:15

  But I would have thought it was a little weird if right after my wife gave birth, like this whole group of like custodians from the middle school show up that I've never met before.

  11:15-11:27

  Like, who are you people?" And they're like, "God told us to come because you were having a baby." I'm like, "Get out!" But the shepherds just show up.

  11:30-11:32

  because... and here's the point I want to make.

  11:34-11:35

  Simply because God told them to show up.

  11:37-11:39

  This wasn't a typical baby announcement.

  11:40-11:46

  Typically when people give the announcement that they're having a baby, a lot of the focus is on the couple, right? A lot of the focus is on mom, right?

  11:46-12:11

  Interestingly, look at what it says in this passage, verse 11, When this baby announcement was made and these angels were proclaiming to the shepherds that Jesus was to be born, verse 11 says, "For unto you is born this day." The shepherds are standing there, "Somebody's having a baby for me?" That's what the angel said.

  12:12-12:15

  "This baby is going to have significance for you.

  12:17-12:32

  A Savior, the Christ, the Messiah, the Lord, He's here." But what I want you to see first of all, very simply this, the shepherds believed the message that the Lord gave them.

  12:33-12:35

  How do we know that they believed?

  12:35-12:37

  Have you ever wondered that for yourself?

  12:37-12:46

  I know when I was a very young Christian, right when I came to Christ, I remember I just started reading the Bible and I had this little crisis of faith as a young Christian.

  12:46-12:49

  I remember reading the Bible saying, "Do I really believe this?

  12:50-12:52

  Do I really believe this?

  12:52-12:54

  Has anybody else ever asked yourself that?

  12:54-12:55

  Do I really believe?

  12:58-13:06

  Well, we know that the shepherds believed the Word of God given to them because they acted upon what God told them.

  13:07-13:11

  There are actually three levels of belief.

  13:13-13:15

  The first level is just simply knowing the information.

  13:16-13:18

  You know the information.

  13:18-13:20

  The second level is you agree with the information.

  13:23-13:27

  And the third level is you act upon the information that you know and agree with.

  13:28-14:02

  You see, Christmas time, as churches are being packed, I would say it's probably in the high 90% of people who know the message, and it's probably a pretty high percentage of people who would even agree with the message, who would walk out of the church, and they wouldn't say, "Well, I don't believe any of that stuff." They'd walk out of church and say, "Yeah, yeah, I think maybe that stuff might have probably happened." But biblically, true belief, true faith is taking it to the level that these shepherds took it, acting upon what I know and agree with.

  14:04-14:05

  Biblical faith getting to level three.

  14:06-14:08

  You say, "Well, wait, what does level three look like?

  14:08-14:14

  How do I act upon faith?" I'm going to give you three R words.

  14:14-14:18

  These are the things that you do to act upon your faith, and the first one is repent.

  14:20-14:21

  Andy had mentioned this earlier.

  14:23-14:27

  Sin had come into the world and destroyed man's relationship with God.

  14:28-14:33

  And the first step in coming to the Lord is acknowledging that you're a sinner.

  14:33-14:35

  I can't do anything to save myself.

  14:35-14:35

  I can't.

  14:35-14:37

  I can't do enough good works.

  14:37-14:38

  I can't go to church enough.

  14:38-14:40

  I can't be nice enough to people.

  14:40-14:46

  those things won't cancel out this problem that I have, that I'm guilty of sin.

  14:47-14:50

  And biblically, repentance is changing your mind.

  14:50-14:57

  By nature, sometimes we think we're good people, and surely God's going to see the good stuff that I've done and He's going to let me into heaven.

  14:57-14:59

  Repentance means you change your mind and say, "You know what?

  14:59-15:03

  I realize I'm guilty of sin." Secondly, receive.

  15:04-15:04

  Repent of your sin.

  15:04-15:06

  Receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.

  15:08-15:10

  Receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.

  15:10-15:11

  This is where it becomes very personal.

  15:12-15:47

  You see, it has to turn from "The Christmas story is a history lesson" to "The Christmas story has impact on my life." It has to go from "Jesus was born in Bethlehem" to "God came to the world for me." It has to go from 33 years later Jesus died on the cross, to Jesus died on the cross for me.

  15:47-15:53

  It has to get from a historical fact to a personal appropriation of the truth.

  15:54-15:56

  Repent, receive, and then react.

  15:57-15:58

  You need to grow as a disciple.

  15:59-16:07

  You need to find a church like this one that preaches the Word of God and encourages your walk with the Lord.

  16:08-16:10

  We believe that a disciple does three things.

  16:10-16:14

  A disciple worships Christ, walks with Christ, and works for Christ.

  16:15-16:17

  Those things are the fruit of somebody being a disciple.

  16:17-16:21

  That's reacting to what God's doing in you through Jesus Christ.

  16:23-16:29

  You'll know that you're growing as a disciple when the Word of God and the Holy Spirit are making decisions for you.

  16:32-16:50

  Like the shepherds, you hear the message from God about His Son, and you don't debate it, you don't consider it, "I'll think about it." You get moving on it, act upon it, listen up, be ready to respond to God's Word.

  16:51-16:52

  That's what I love about the shepherds.

  16:52-16:53

  They heard it and they were gone.

  16:53-16:56

  With haste, let's go.

  16:56-16:57

  Moving on the Word of God.

  16:58-17:03

  Secondly, speak up. Speak up.

  17:04-17:10

  People need to hear what you know about Jesus Christ.

  17:10-17:12

  Look at verses 17 and 18.

  17:14-17:20

  It says, "And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.

  17:21-17:35

  And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them." These shepherds left this manger scene fired up and ready to tell people what they saw.

  17:36-17:48

  Imagine tonight, across this city, across this state, across this country, as people are packing into churches to celebrate the birth of Christ.

  17:48-17:55

  Imagine tonight if everybody that left these churches was fired up about the message of Jesus Christ as these shepherds were.

  17:56-17:59

  Imagine what that would do to your community.

  17:59-18:01

  Imagine what that would do to this city.

  18:02-18:12

  If everybody left here like these shepherds, just fired up that God became a man and He gave us this incredible message of salvation through Jesus Christ.

  18:14-18:17

  Why aren't more people fired up about evangelism?

  18:18-18:26

  You know, some people say, "Well, people are afraid they're going to be asked a question they don't know, Maybe I don't know enough to share.

  18:26-18:28

  Maybe I'm afraid of rejection.

  18:29-18:32

  And maybe that's why people aren't more fired up about evangelism.

  18:32-18:39

  But I really believe the main reason that people aren't fired up about evangelism is because they're not captured and gripped by the message themselves.

  18:41-18:45

  Because every great evangelist I know has that common denominator.

  18:45-18:51

  They are so gripped by the message of Jesus Christ that they can't stop talking about it.

  18:52-18:54

  because it is awesome to them.

  18:56-19:01

  20 years ago, I worked at Walmart.

  19:02-19:03

  And I don't know how it happened.

  19:05-19:09

  When I started working at Walmart, I was like taking out garbage and cleaning bathrooms and things like that.

  19:09-19:14

  But somehow, I got transferred to the automotive department in Walmart.

  19:17-19:21

  And I remember when I worked in the automotive department, I was a bus driver for quite a while.

  19:22-19:32

  Every shift, every day I went into work, I dreaded people wanting to come to me and ask me about cars.

  19:33-19:35

  Because I know nothing about cars.

  19:37-19:37

  Nothing.

  19:39-19:46

  And my wife Erin, bless her heart, if there's something wrong with the car, she's like, "Pop the hood and take a look at it." I do.

  19:47-19:51

  I do, I pop the hood and I look at it and Aaron's like, well, what do you think?

  19:51-19:54

  And I'm like, well, the engine's still there, so that's not the problem.

  19:56-19:58

  She has more faith in me than I do, honestly.

  19:59-20:09

  I dreaded people coming to the automotive department of Walmart and wanting to talk to me about cars, but it would happen almost every day.

  20:09-20:10

  And it was so uncomfortable for me.

  20:11-20:21

  I'd get some guy come in and he'd be like, yeah, I just dropped the chassis on my catalytic fuel and discovered the vascometer intake was corroded.

  20:21-20:22

  Can you believe that?

  20:24-20:32

  And I would say, you know, this air freshener will make your car smell like puppy breath.

  20:32-20:33

  Here, why don't you check this out?

  20:36-20:37

  But the truth is, you're never afraid.

  20:39-20:51

  You're never afraid to talk about something that you're excited about, whether it's football or scrapbooking or your cat or whatever, you're never afraid to talk about something that you're excited about.

  20:51-20:58

  And when you immerse yourself in the gospel, in God's Word, you will get excited about it.

  20:59-21:04

  I have a good friend that, I love it, he calls me up, he's like, "Man, you're not going to believe what I read in the Bible.

  21:04-21:15

  Do you know what I studied this week? And did you know this?" And he's always so excited about the Bible because he's in it, And he's reading it, and he's studying it.

  21:15-21:19

  And when you go after that, you're going to be excited about it.

  21:20-21:26

  So speak up, pray for, and look for, and take the opportunities to share what you know.

  21:28-21:35

  You're like, "Well, I don't know very much." Well, if you know enough to be saved, you start there.

  21:36-21:38

  You know your testimony, don't you?

  21:38-21:41

  Can you tell somebody the effect that Jesus Christ has had on your life?

  21:42-21:44

  Can you tell somebody how He's changed you?

  21:44-21:54

  And yes, I'm not perfect, and yes, I'm not yet the person that I want to be, but He's changed me from being the person that I was, and I'm heading to heaven, and I'm born again, and there's going to be some bumps along the way.

  21:56-21:58

  What a difference Jesus Christ makes in your life.

  21:59-22:01

  You see, in God's Word, that's what the shepherds did.

  22:03-22:04

  They just shared what they knew.

  22:06-22:15

  They just went out and said, God came and told us this message about this baby and who the baby was going to be, and can you believe we saw the baby?

  22:17-22:19

  How effective were they as preachers?

  22:19-22:21

  Well, verse 18 says the people wandered.

  22:22-22:24

  Whoa, whoa, whoa, tell us more about that!

  22:25-22:27

  Wow! Wow, what can this mean?

  22:28-22:28

  They wandered.

  22:30-22:30

  Speak up.

  22:31-22:33

  People need to hear what you know about Jesus.

  22:33-22:35

  And then finally, look up.

  22:37-22:42

  Look up, seeing God at work changes you.

  22:43-22:45

  Look at these last couple of verses.

  22:46-22:55

  It says, "But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart." Mary, very introspective here, as you can imagine.

  22:58-23:00

  It says the same thing in verse 51, I believe.

  23:01-23:13

  Verse 20 says, "And the shepherds returned," look at this, "glorifying and praising God all they had heard and seen as it had been told them." Glorifying and praising.

  23:14-23:19

  The shepherds had to go back to work, but they were never the same, were they?

  23:20-23:29

  I imagine those shepherds, I don't know, the Bible doesn't really tell us, but I imagine those shepherds for the rest of their lives probably never talked about anything else.

  23:29-23:31

  Could you imagine hanging out with them?

  23:32-23:34

  Like, "Hey, how are the sheep? Sheep are good.

  23:35-23:39

  Did I ever tell you about that time that the angel showed up with the baby and the swaddling cloths in the manger?

  23:39-23:42

  Like, "Yeah, you told us that yesterday." Well, hang on, I've got to tell you again.

  23:43-23:51

  "Hey, how's your family doing?" "Oh, my family's good." Did I ever tell you about the time that we walked in right after the woman gave birth and we saw God in the flesh?

  23:51-23:52

  Can I tell you that story?

  23:54-23:59

  And when God grips your heart with the message of Jesus, you're never the same.

  24:00-24:03

  Your life is now about praise.

  24:05-24:12

  And there might be some here tonight, many Christmases away from the original birth of Jesus Christ, saying, "You know what?

  24:13-24:15

  You know what, Jeff? I hear what you're saying, and I'm going to tell you something.

  24:15-24:19

  If I was one of those shepherds, I'd probably just as fired up.

  24:19-24:32

  In fact, if I was one of those shepherds, I might even be more fired up." Well, you and I have even more reason to live a life of praise and worship because we know the rest of the story.

  24:34-24:49

  That baby grew up, and just as he was laid on a manger this night, he was laid on a wooden cross to die for our sins.

  24:51-24:55

  Three days later, He rose from the dead to give us eternal life.

  24:57-25:08

  The shepherds, yeah, they heard and believed the message and they saw God in the flesh, but church, we have heard and believed the message and we have God personally indwelling us.

  25:10-25:14

  They were changed from the experience.

  25:14-25:18

  We are changed from the inside out by God's holy presence.

  25:19-25:20

  We have reason to celebrate.

  25:22-25:27

  If you're like me sometimes, it gets to be close to Christmas, and you can be a bit of a scrooge.

  25:27-25:29

  Not you, when I say you, I mean me.

  25:29-25:36

  I can be a bit of a scrooge sometimes because of all the other stuff that goes with it.

  25:36-25:41

  I love the story, I love the story of the Incarnation, it never gets old, it gets better every time I hear it.

  25:42-25:49

  I'm just talking about all that extra stuff It's easy to get sort of grumpy about it.

  25:50-25:57

  I'd just like to encourage you, when you're tempted to get distracted, worship God for who He is.

  25:59-26:04

  When you're tempted to get annoyed, praise God for what He's done.

  26:05-26:13

  And when you're tempted to be worn out by all the festivities, remember who it's really about.

  26:15-26:27

  If you make it your aim to listen up and speak up and look up, like the shepherds maybe every year, you're going to hear yourself saying, "This was the best Christmas ever.

  26:28-26:37

  You pray with me." Father in heaven, I thank you for the very simple message that we see from the shepherds.

  26:37-26:41

  They were just simple people who just heard your word and acted on it.

  26:42-26:47

  they were people who weren't shy about telling other people what they saw.

  26:48-26:54

  And they were people whose very lives were characterized by praise and worship after they left their encounter with Jesus Christ.

  26:55-27:00

  Father, I pray for the churches represented here tonight.

  27:02-27:10

  I thank you Father for the way that the message of Jesus Christ, the message of the Incarnation, the message of the Gospel, and the cross, and the empty tomb.

  27:10-27:15

  I thank you for the way, God, in 2015, you are still changing lives.

  27:16-27:19

  You are still saving people from themselves.

  27:20-27:25

  You're still saving people from the condemnation of God that we so rightly deserve.

  27:25-27:30

  And you're doing it all through this glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

  27:31-27:39

  The Father, in the midst of everything else going on, The Word tells us that the Word itself is like a seed.

  27:40-27:47

  And I pray God that this seed is taking deep roots, bearing much roots.

  27:48-27:50

  We pray these things in Jesus' name.

  27:51-27:51

  Amen.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Luke 2:8-20

Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.

God Was One of Us

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).

1. ...to be my SUBSTITUTE . (Hebrews 2:9-10)



2. ...to be my SANCTIFIER . (Hebrews 2:11-13)



3. ...to be my SYMPATHIZER . (Hebrews 2:17-18)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

• Audio Transcript

  00:00-00:04

  It was March of 1995.

  00:04-00:07

  It was right around the time that I came to Christ.

  00:07-00:14

  And I think that's why this particular song caught my attention.

  00:14-00:22

  How many people remember this one-hit wonder from Joan Osborne called "One of Us"?

  00:22-00:24

  How many people remember that song?

  00:25-00:28

  "What if God was one of us?" Do you know that song?

  00:29-00:35

  I was going to sing it for you, and my wife has been begging me not to.

  00:37-00:40

  But Joan Osborne didn't write this song, she just performed it.

  00:40-00:42

  It was written by a guy named Eric Bazilian.

  00:44-00:45

  The lyrics go like this.

  00:47-00:49

  Now this isn't, by the way, this isn't a Christian song, okay?

  00:49-00:50

  This didn't come out of a hymnal.

  00:52-00:55

  If you know the song, this reminds you of the lyrics.

  00:56-00:57

  What if God was one of us?

  00:58-01:01

  The song goes, "If God had a name, what would it be?

  01:04-01:05

  And would you call to His face?

  01:07-01:16

  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.

  01:16-01:17

  Yeah, yeah, God is good.

  01:18-01:18

  Yeah.

  01:20-01:21

  What if God was one of us?

  01:22-01:25

  Just a slob like one of us.

  01:27-01:29

  Just a stranger on the bus trying to make his way home.

  01:32-01:37

  Then the next verse says, "If God had a face, what would it look like?

  01:39-02:25

  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.

  02:26-02:38

  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.

  02:41-02:42

  This simple truth.

  02:43-02:44

  God was one of us.

  02:46-02:52

  And this idea of God coming to be a part of His creation.

  02:54-02:55

  Coming to the earth as a man.

  02:56-02:57

  Understand that it wasn't an afterthought.

  02:58-03:03

  It wasn't like God was in heaven looking down and pacing, thinking what am I going to do?

  03:03-03:09

  How am I going to teach these people about me and what I'm like and the grace and the truth?

  03:09-03:11

  How am I going to - oh, I've got an idea.

  03:12-03:13

  I'll just become a man.

  03:13-03:15

  It wasn't an afterthought.

  03:16-03:18

  It was the plan from the very beginning.

  03:19-03:40

  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?

  03:43-03:53

  "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.

  03:53-03:57

  So very clearly, the prophecy says the Messiah is going to be God.

  03:58-04:04

  Micah 5:2 Another popular passage that's read at Christmas.

  04:05-04:16

  "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.

  04:17-04:22

  Coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.

  04:22-04:25

  See, that's not something that can be fulfilled by just some guy.

  04:26-04:30

  Talking about a Messiah who is from ancient times.

  04:31-04:32

  From of old.

  04:33-04:36

  That can only describe God Himself.

  04:38-04:40

  This was perfectly fulfilled in the New Testament.

  04:41-04:42

  Matthew 1.

  04:42-04:43

  Can we get that up there?

  04:46-04:48

  The birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.

  04:49-04:55

  When His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.

  04:57-05:02

  And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

  05:04-05:21

  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.

  05:23-05:26

  She will bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus.

  05:29-05:37

  For He will save His people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet.

  05:38-05:51

  "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.

  05:53-06:15

  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.

  06:16-06:20

  And I want to give you Words of encouragement.

  06:22-06:24

  On your outline, God was one of us.

  06:26-06:28

  And God was with us.

  06:28-06:28

  Emmanuel.

  06:30-06:32

  We're going to look at three reasons that He came.

  06:32-06:35

  Three reasons that God became a man.

  06:35-06:37

  And the first one is this - write this down.

  06:37-06:39

  God was with us to be my substitute.

  06:41-06:43

  God was with us to be my substitute.

  06:46-07:11

  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.

  07:12-07:49

  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.

  07:52-07:55

  Well, why would He want to taste death?

  07:57-08:01

  Well, the Bible tells us that the wages of sin is death.

  08:02-08:05

  Death is the penalty for sin.

  08:05-08:08

  And somebody might say, well, wait a minute, we're all going to die.

  08:09-08:13

  Does that mean that we all are under the penalty of sin no matter what?

  08:13-08:23

  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.

  08:24-08:28

  But if you understand the original Hebrew, the phrase is literally this.

  08:28-08:43

  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.

  08:46-08:51

  Dying you will die. That's why church, that's why we are getting old and wearing out.

  08:53-09:00

  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.

  09:00-09:02

  That was a long time ago.

  09:03-09:07

  I try to run now and it's embarrassing. It is really embarrassing.

  09:08-09:29

  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?

  09:31-09:31

  Why is that?

  09:38-09:40

  because wearing out, dying, we will die.

  09:41-09:45

  And see, when we think of death, we immediately think of casket death.

  09:45-09:47

  We think of the funeral home.

  09:48-09:49

  But death literally means separation.

  09:50-09:57

  It's the spirit being separated from the body, and with sin, we are separated from God.

  10:00-10:01

  Death is the penalty for sin.

  10:04-10:20

  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.

  10:20-10:22

  The Bible calls him the second Adam.

  10:24-10:28

  He brought forgiveness and life and reconciliation with God.

  10:31-10:40

  In other words, man brought sin into the world, so man needed to pay the penalty for sin.

  10:41-10:46

  The problem is none of us are qualified to do that.

  10:47-11:28

  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.

  11:30-11:32

  But the only one who is sinless is God.

  11:34-11:42

  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.

  11:42-11:45

  Jesus Christ, God in the flesh.

  11:46-11:49

  Jesus wasn't half man and half God.

  11:50-11:57

  Jesus, 100% man and 100% God at the same time.

  11:58-12:03

  God's perfect man and man's perfect God.

  12:05-12:12

  That's why this time of year, sometimes these magazines and newspaper articles will-- revisit the virgin birth.

  12:12-12:22

  And by the way, there's this whole movement-- the statistics are sickening-- of churches and pastors that are denying the virgin birth.

  12:22-12:27

  That say, "Yeah, the virgin birth isn't that important." I have no problem with the virgin birth.

  12:27-12:28

  You know why?

  12:28-12:35

  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.

  12:37-12:40

  He has to be both, as the Bible says He is.

  12:43-12:46

  So God was with us, first of all, to be my substitute.

  12:47-12:49

  Is He your substitute?

  12:50-12:52

  Is Jesus Christ your substitute?

  12:53-12:56

  You have two options when it comes to dealing with your sin.

  12:57-13:01

  Your one option is you can face God yourself and deal with the consequences.

  13:02-13:04

  Face God's wrath for your own sin.

  13:04-13:05

  You have that option.

  13:05-13:06

  I wouldn't recommend it.

  13:07-13:15

  But you see, the other option is that you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, believing that He tasted death for you.

  13:16-13:17

  That's really where it has to go.

  13:18-13:26

  Is taking it from this story of yes, Jesus Christ - God in the flesh was born and He came to die.

  13:27-13:35

  It's making it personal to say God took on flesh, He was born, and He came to die for me.

  13:36-13:44

  You have to make that bridge where it goes from a count in history something God did for you personally.

  13:46-13:49

  First of all, God was with us to be my substitute.

  13:50-13:54

  Secondly, God was with us to be my sanctifier.

  13:55-13:56

  To be my sanctifier.

  13:56-13:58

  Look at verses 11-13.

  13:59-14:06

  It says, "For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source.

  14:06-14:16

  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.

  14:17-14:19

  And again, I will put my trust in Him.

  14:19-14:24

  And again, behold, I and the children God has given me.

  14:25-14:32

  So not only did God become a man to be my substitute, but God became a man to be my sanctifier.

  14:33-14:40

  This is the glorious truth of the Gospel, that Jesus Christ didn't just come to erase your sin.

  14:42-14:44

  That's only half the Gospel.

  14:45-14:50

  This idea that Jesus died so that my sins are forgiven, that's half the Gospel.

  14:51-14:57

  The other half of the Gospel is Jesus rose from the dead to give me eternal life.

  14:58-15:00

  But not just eternal life.

  15:01-15:06

  To me, this is the most profound doctrine in the entire Bible.

  15:07-15:23

  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.

  15:24-15:27

  That's the most profound thing in the whole Bible to me.

  15:28-15:33

  You know, we can talk about creation and virgin birth and Trinity, and we can talk about all of those things.

  15:35-15:36

  I get that.

  15:38-15:52

  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.

  15:54-15:55

  And it's not because of what I've done.

  15:56-15:58

  It's because of what He's done for me.

  15:58-16:00

  That's called imputed righteousness.

  16:00-16:04

  He puts His righteousness on my spiritual accounts.

  16:06-16:16

  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.

  16:17-16:22

  That verse says that in Christ, we become the righteousness of God.

  16:24-16:32

  And that's what the Hebrew writer is talking about here when he says, "For he who sanctifies..." sanctifies means He makes holy.

  16:33-16:35

  God demands that we are holy.

  16:35-16:36

  Did you know that?

  16:36-16:37

  He demands it.

  16:38-16:40

  God doesn't have a loose policy on holiness.

  16:41-16:42

  He demands that we're holy.

  16:42-16:45

  We don't have it, so the good news is God gives it to us, right?

  16:46-16:47

  That's grace.

  16:47-16:50

  God giving to us what He requires from us.

  16:52-16:53

  He gives us His holiness.

  16:56-16:58

  I'm going to tell you, I've read this a billion times.

  17:00-17:06

  And this truth just really gripped me in a special way this week.

  17:06-17:07

  The truth in verse 11.

  17:10-17:14

  It says He sanctifies - look at the last phrase in verse 11.

  17:14-17:31

  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.

  17:33-17:34

  I want you to think about that.

  17:36-17:47

  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.

  17:49-17:54

  One of the questions I get asked often, "That worship leader, is he your brother?

  17:55-18:11

  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.

  18:13-18:18

  They're like, "Is that your brother, the worship leader?" You know what, I just met him last week.

  18:20-18:21

  Barely know the guy.

  18:22-18:29

  And if you've been here more than a couple weeks, you realize that problems with worship aren't typical.

  18:31-18:33

  But I imagine the conversation might go the other way.

  18:34-18:43

  When the sermon goes well, Darren's like, "Yeah, that's my brother." And when the sermon tanks, you see the point, right?

  18:45-18:47

  Here's the truth that really gripped me.

  18:49-18:50

  I want you to listen to this very closely.

  18:51-18:52

  Somebody here needs to hear this.

  18:53-18:58

  Jesus Christ calls us His brothers and sisters.

  19:00-19:02

  Brethren, you get that, right?

  19:02-19:07

  Jesus Christ calls us His brothers and is not ashamed of it.

  19:08-19:14

  Sometimes, honestly, sometimes I think Sometimes I think maybe He should be ashamed of me.

  19:16-19:18

  Sometimes I think maybe He should be.

  19:20-19:23

  But your Bible tells you that He never is.

  19:25-19:26

  He never is.

  19:27-19:28

  I was thinking about that this week.

  19:28-19:34

  You know, sometimes we're ashamed to call Jesus ours.

  19:36-19:37

  Can somebody explain that to me?

  19:38-19:41

  Can somebody explain to me what it is about Jesus you might be ashamed of?

  19:43-19:46

  Has Jesus done something that might embarrass you?

  19:47-19:54

  When I study his life and his ministry, why would we be ashamed of being associated with Jesus?

  19:54-19:55

  But so often we are.

  19:56-19:58

  We don't want to be looked at as the religious person.

  20:00-20:02

  Sometimes we're ashamed to call Jesus ours, but church.

  20:03-20:07

  Jesus is never ashamed of us.

  20:08-20:09

  Think about that.

  20:10-20:17

  Imagine this conversation where the devil's like, "Mark Ward, huh?

  20:18-20:19

  Mark Ward, Jesus.

  20:20-20:28

  He's one of yours, huh?" Jesus says, "Yes, He is." The devil's like, "Did you see what He did this week?

  20:29-20:31

  Did you hear the way He talked to that person this week?

  20:31-20:37

  Did you see what He did?" Jesus says, "I see everything." You're not ashamed of him?

  20:39-20:40

  Jesus says, "Not for a second.

  20:42-20:47

  I'm not ashamed because I pronounced him holy and he's my brother.

  20:48-20:59

  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.

  21:01-21:01

  I'm such a loser.

  21:03-21:20

  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.

  21:21-21:23

  Your Bible says He is not ashamed.

  21:25-21:35

  I can walk in humble confidence because Jesus has pronounced me holy and He is not ashamed of me.

  21:37-21:44

  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.

  21:45-21:46

  No matter how bad you mess up.

  21:48-21:49

  He's not ashamed.

  21:50-22:03

  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.

  22:04-22:05

  Jump down to verse 16.

  22:06-22:11

  The Hebrew writer says, "For surely it is not angels that He helps, but He helps the offspring of Abraham.

  22:13-22:31

  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.

  22:33-22:35

  I want to stop here for a second.

  22:35-22:38

  This word "propitiation," it's a big word.

  22:38-22:41

  It's used a couple times in the Bible, but it's a very important word.

  22:41-22:48

  What that word means-- write this down-- the word "propitiation" means God is satisfied with the work of Christ.

  22:49-22:50

  That's so important.

  22:51-22:53

  It means that God is satisfied.

  22:54-23:00

  When Jesus died on the cross, remember He cried out, "It is finished." Meaning paid in full.

  23:01-23:03

  Your sin has been covered completely.

  23:03-23:06

  Taken away. Forgiven. Forever.

  23:07-23:09

  The word "propitiation" goes along with that.

  23:10-23:11

  God is satisfied.

  23:12-23:17

  When Jesus gave His life as a substitute for you, God's not still mad at you.

  23:17-23:18

  That's why he's not ashamed.

  23:19-23:20

  He's not still mad.

  23:20-23:32

  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.

  23:33-23:34

  God says, "I'm satisfied.

  23:34-23:45

  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.

  23:47-23:50

  God is satisfied with the work of Jesus.

  23:51-23:52

  So God's not mad at you.

  23:53-23:55

  Look at this last phrase.

  23:55-24:07

  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.

  24:09-24:10

  He was literally human.

  24:12-24:25

  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.

  24:27-24:33

  Yes, Jesus performed miracles and walked on water and healed.

  24:35-24:45

  But when you read your Gospels, you see that Jesus - God in the flesh - Jesus experienced thirst.

  24:46-24:47

  Jesus got tired.

  24:48-24:53

  The Bible says that Jesus even wept on multiple occasions.

  24:55-25:06

  So this gives God - understand how I mean this - this gives God a sort of special dimension of understanding through experience.

  25:06-25:19

  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.

  25:19-25:21

  I'm not saying that God lacked the knowledge.

  25:21-25:22

  Here's what I am saying.

  25:23-25:33

  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.

  25:33-25:36

  You have no idea what it's like, God.

  25:38-25:44

  Because of the incarnation, Because God became a man, He knows.

  25:45-25:46

  Have you ever been betrayed by someone?

  25:47-25:48

  Have you ever been betrayed?

  25:50-25:51

  Jesus knows what that's like.

  25:52-25:56

  One of His best friends betrayed Him for a handful of coins.

  25:58-25:59

  Have you ever been rejected?

  26:00-26:02

  Jesus knows what that's like.

  26:02-26:06

  Even His own family rejected Him during His earthly ministry.

  26:08-26:09

  Have you ever been misunderstood?

  26:10-26:12

  Jesus understands what that's like.

  26:14-26:24

  Have you ever been just so exhausted and your body is just so tired, but there's so much to do ahead of you?

  26:26-26:27

  He understands.

  26:28-26:29

  He knows.

  26:30-26:31

  Have you ever been tempted?

  26:33-26:34

  Every one of us have.

  26:35-27:38

  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?

  27:38-27:54

  "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.

  28:02-28:06

  For example, take a victim of domestic violence.

  28:07-28:24

  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.

  28:26-28:28

  The Bible tells us that God became a man.

  28:30-28:33

  And forever answers the question, does God really understand?

  28:34-28:36

  Does God really understand?

  28:38-28:42

  God was with us to be my sympathizer in every way.

  28:43-28:55

  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.

  28:56-29:09

  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?

  29:10-29:12

  We can get this salvation thing done in three days.

  29:14-29:16

  But he didn't do that, did he?

  29:17-29:24

  He decided to live a total human experience.

  29:25-29:29

  When God became a man, He didn't just step down from Heaven.

  29:30-29:42

  He came through the womb of a woman in the manner that every other human being after Adam and Eve came into the world.

  29:44-29:45

  Church, this is worth celebrating.

  29:47-29:56

  At Christmas, we marvel again that God was with us as one of us.

  29:58-30:00

  In just a moment, we're going to invite you to come down and pray.

  30:02-30:11

  Maybe there's somebody here this morning that says, you know, I've never received Jesus Christ as my substitute.

  30:13-30:15

  believing that He took my place on the cross.

  30:17-30:22

  I can't think of a better time to come down and pray with somebody from our prayer team.

  30:25-30:34

  Maybe there's somebody here that says, you know, Pastor Jeff, I've been in this depression for a long time.

  30:34-30:36

  And to be honest with you, I've felt like a Christian loser.

  30:37-30:41

  And I've felt like God must be You're so embarrassed by Me.

  30:42-30:44

  I'd like to remind you today that He's your sanctifier.

  30:45-30:46

  And He's not ashamed of you.

  30:47-30:53

  Maybe you need to come down and pray and be reminded of that.

  30:55-31:08

  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.

  31:08-31:18

  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.

  31:19-31:28

  And He experienced everything that we go through so that He can be a merciful and sympathetic High Priest.

  31:29-31:30

  Will you bow your heads and pray with me?

  31:31-31:36

  And as our worship team leads us in a closing song, we're going to invite you to come up front and pray.

  31:37-31:48

  Father in Heaven, we thank You that Your Word is so clear on the significance of the incarnation.

  31:49-31:55

  Because, Father, we realize that if You didn't literally become a man, You couldn't literally be our substitute.

  31:56-32:01

  If You didn't literally become a man, Jesus couldn't call us brothers.

  32:01-32:05

  There's nowhere in Your Word, Father, that You call us brothers.

  32:07-32:09

  This Word tells us that You are our Heavenly Father.

  32:10-32:17

  But somehow Jesus through His death and His resurrection now calls us His brothers.

  32:18-32:28

  Father, if You didn't become a man, we would be wondering if You really understood what the human experience was like.

  32:28-32:30

  What it was like to be tempted.

  32:30-32:58

  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.

  33:00-33:02

  We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Hebrews 2:9-18

1. 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?
    

2. 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.