Advent: Love

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

Thank you, Harringtons. Well, if you have not met the newest member of our church family, this is Oakley Simmons, and he is adorable, isn't he? You can clap for him if you want to. He's just that cute. Please clap for cute. I don't know if you know this about a newborn baby but or I mean how old is he exactly six weeks okay close enough there is a there is a strange and wonderful power that newborn babies have over adults where if all of you are resisting right now you're resisting the urge to make eye contact with the baby and to make faces so that the baby smiles you're resisting it because this is what adults do. Adults lose all of their composure. Look at Amy, she wants to just stare at him, just he can't even see you, he's six weeks old, but that's fine. Just adorable. And there's something about a newborn baby, right? There's just something about a baby when you see it

and you're just, you just want to squeeze them, you know, you just want to hold You just want to make them smile. You just want to make them laugh. And you will look stupid doing it, okay? You're just making the weirdest faces, the weirdest sounds. And adult, this is universal. Adults, you will do this. When we think about Christmas, a lot of times we are really busy thinking about a newborn baby, right? And that's good. Jesus came as a newborn baby. Here, I'm gonna give Oakley back because I think my time's about to run short. Thank you, Patrick. and Eliza, okay. You're on the clock with the baby like that. It's okay.

He said it right before because he knew he was gonna have some stage time. So he's like, I gotta get this out. Okay. When we are thinking about Christmas, we think about a newborn baby. In fact, we get kinda so enamored with this that even when we're singing Away in a Manger, We think that we consider Jesus, we think about him asleep. Where? Asleep, asleep in the hay, right, asleep. And does he make any noise? No, no crying he makes, right? Like it's a, listen, this is, I don't know, I know that Jesus is the God-man, and so I'm assuming he was a different kind of baby than a normal baby, but I can almost guarantee that baby cried, okay? Baby Jesus cried, he needed his diaper changed. He was a baby and that Mary and Joseph made their faces at him. I'm sure that the shepherds even maybe made some faces at him to try to get him to smile. And that he was cute. And really, this is kind of the paradox of Christmas, right?

The paradox of Christmas is that we sing about a sleeping baby, but we also at the exact same time celebrate why that baby came. You can see this in the very famous Christmas song, Mary Did You Know. Mary Did You Know? If you've not heard it, it's a trip. It's a song written to Mary, and it says Mary, did you know that your little baby is going to do all these really crazy things later? It's things like Mary, did you know that your baby boy will give sight to a blind man? Mary, did you know that your baby boy will calm the storm with his hand? Okay. And it's kind of mind-blowing the very first time you hear it and then it gets old, but it's fine. It's a great song. Your mind can only be blown so many times by that song. But if you go back and look at the lyrics, what it doesn't speak about directly is the cross. Now, it's not a knock on Mary, did you know?

But it is to point out something, that it is difficult for us to imagine a little baby growing up to suffer torture. We look a little Oakley, and we just think that kid's beautiful, that there's no way that kid's gonna have a hard life, there's no way that that kid's going to suffer anything, there's no way that, but it's true. It's uncomfortable to think about the horrible death that Jesus would undergo when we're thinking about Jesus as a baby. It's a very strange thing, but this is Christmas. This is actually what we celebrate. We celebrate both. This is the paradox. We celebrate Jesus in the manger there, and we, not that manger. Well, we celebrate Jesus in the manger, and we also celebrate Jesus on the cross, that is both. It's not, we don't divide it. We don't say no, we don't talk about the cross at Christmas, or no, we don't talk about him being born at, on Easter, or something, I don't know.

We celebrate both in the major and on the cross. And so as we read the Christmas story this morning, of how Jesus came to earth, let's also remember what awaited Him as He came to earth. Let's see the baby, let's see the manger, but let's also see the cross. A really helpful text on this, we're going to kind of read two texts parallel to one another. So we're going to read Luke 2 because it's Christmas Eve, so we'd better read Luke 2. Okay, but we're also gonna read Isaiah 53 with Luke two. Okay, we're gonna kinda read both. If you don't wanna keep going back and forth in your Bible, that's fine, you can like pick one and the rest is gonna be on the screen as we go. Isaiah 53 particularly is a prophecy about what awaited Jesus on earth. So this is written several hundred years before Jesus came. Jesus came as the Messiah, the Isaiah 53 is talking about the Messiah,

what the Messiah's life is going to be like whenever he's on earth. And so this is what we read in Isaiah 53, verses two and three. It says, for he grew up before him like a young plant. Just talking about Jesus. And like a root out of dry ground, he had no form or majesty that we should look at him and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. and is one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised, and we esteemed him not. This is prophecy because it's talking about Jesus' ministry, the kind of ministry that he's going to have. He's gonna have a ministry that is full of grief and sorrow and not just at the cross, but before that he's gonna be unesteemed, he's gonna be reviled. People are gonna hide their faces from him. But doesn't it also describe Jesus' birth? Right? It also describes his birth.

Let's switch over to Luke two verses one through three. It says, in those days, a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. And this was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered each to his own town. I wanna pause there for just a second and say, as Luke who's writing this gospel, as he's writing these verses, what really what he's going to kind of put an emphasis on, and it's hard because we read these verses every year and it's the Christmas story and why are we looking for something different? But it's here, Luke, as he describes Jesus' birth, really accents on the lowliness of Jesus' birth. Even in, as he's describing it here, he's talking about Jesus and he's not born into power or wealth or status that he's actually born subject to outside forces. His place of birth is being determined by some census that some bureaucrat made up

really you know like over there okay this isn't this isn't this doesn't smell like God ordained anything this just seems like the the government wheels grinding okay that's all this is it's a it's a census that somebody decided to to declare, and that meant people had to go back to their hometown. So this, this is what Jesus is born into. He's the son of the king. And normally, sons of the king are born wherever the king wants them to be born. Census or not. But that doesn't seem like the case here. Let's read verses four and five of Luke two. It says, and Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth to Judea, 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. There's a couple things here that highlights kind of Jesus' loveliness here. The first is that Jesus is not born in the seat of power.

He's not born in Jerusalem, which is, that's the city, right? If you're gonna look at Israel's history, the city of Jerusalem is kind of like their crowning achievement, right? It's a focal point of political power, military power, social power, but he's not born there. He's born in Bethlehem. He's born in Itasca, Texas. He ain't close, nothing wrong with Itasca, but it ain't Dallas, okay? I think we understand the difference here.

He's born outside. And all these references, here's the other thing, there's all these references to King David right here. He's born in the city of David, he's in David's lineage. But all that does is it highlights how Jesus is still born so far away from that royalty. that royalty, right? In other words, it's to say, King David had a descendant and nobody was paying attention.

Nobody's putting on a parade. Nobody's notifying the press. Nobody cares. Even though he's being born in the city of David, even though it's, he's, or outside, and even though he's in the lineage and house of David, Nobody cares, nobody's tracing his heritage. Look at the last two, so verses six and seven. Which I believe punctuates Jesus' humble beginnings, okay? So verse six and seven it says, and while they were there, the time came for her to give birth, and she gave birth to her first born son, and wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. Now there's a lot that's assumed there, okay? There was no place for them in the end. This is the first we hear about the end, okay? But what we all know is that they could not even get a decent room for Jesus to be born in.

And it punctuates his humble beginnings. Jesus was born in a storage shed in Itasca, Texas, okay? Okay, Jesus was born probably in an abandoned storage shed and a rusty one that they couldn't keep all the rain out. And it's so tough to remember this because it's such a familiar story. We read it every Christmas, but that he was born in, I mean, look, that's a beautiful little like manger. That's a very kind of, you know, Hollywood version of what Jesus was born in. He was born in a feed trough in a storage shed in Itasca, Texas. That's humble, that's humble beginnings.

That's like almost nobody wanted you born, right? That's what that tells us, it should, it should tell us, it should help us understand that Jesus was born into a humble beginning, that He was born into something that nobody, nobody's putting on their wish list. Like I really want our new son to be born, you know, in these places. And the lowliness, the insignificance of Jesus's birth foreshadows the kind of life that he's going to have. It foreshadows the things that awaited him that were pointed at in Isaiah 53. And when it says that he had no majesty, that we should look at him. When it says that he had no beauty, that we should desire him. That he was rejected. He was despised, He was a man of sorrow, He was acquainted with grief and we did not esteem Him. All of this birth narrative, all these things, they tell us, they point us to Isaiah 53. And we can see why if we keep reading Isaiah 53.

So flip back to Isaiah 53, and we're gonna read verses four and five. And remember, Isaiah 53, it's a prophecy talking about Jesus's life. Here's what it says. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace.

And with his wounds, we are healed. It is helpful, I think, on the Sunday that we speak about love. The four weeks of Advent we've been talking about hope, then peace. Last week was joy, and now we're into love. And this isn't just the feel-good love that we all, like I love a hamburger. It's a different, obviously, it's a different kind of love than that. But what are we talking about? We're talking about sacrificial love. We're talking about undeserved, sacrificial love. And as we remember this, as we remember that we didn't deserve this, undeserved sacrificial love that sent Jesus to the manger. It was all in view. Verses four and five help us understand like we were the ones who overlooked him. We were the ones who didn't give him glory. We were the transgressors, not him. It was our sin, our iniquities,

to save us from our sin if we believe. And Jesus and the manger, man, just like little Oakley, right? Jesus and the manger so vulnerable, so beautiful. Makes you as an adult, makes you make the dumbest faces. Okay? Just, and that's just you responding to beauty. That's all that is. When you wanna make a face of a kid, that's just you enjoying God's creation right there.

But truly, it is the gospel in simplest terms. And I love, Kenneth, I love that you brought up John 3 16. It is the gospel in simple terms, and it's very familiar to all of us, but let's just think about it. The very first part of that says, for God so loved the world. Okay, so God so, I think I got it up there. Yeah, so loved, okay. That phrase, so loved, it doesn't mean, sometimes it gets translated like, God loved the world so much. Like, that's a, it's like very, okay? He loved the world a whole lot. That's actually not what that means, okay? It means that God loved the world in this way. For God loved the world in this way. This is the way that God loved the world. How did he do it? How did he love the world? He sent his son to it in a manger. Why? To be a sacrifice for us. to make us holy, to save us from our sin. Jesus in the manger is actually the single greatest act

of sacrificial love the world will ever know. In the manger, Jesus in the manger leads us to Jesus on the cross. And when he arrives, he doesn't arrive with fanfare. No status, no wealth. and it forecast the rest of his life. Jesus did not come to be on T-shirts or to write the most famous book ever known, okay? He didn't do that. God sent Jesus to a storage shed in Itasca, Texas to help us understand that Jesus' life and our life in following him, it's not a parade, it's a sacrifice. It's not about fanfare, it's about giving things away. It's not about us, it's about others. It's about serving the Lord as we serve other people.

I wanna end with just looking at Isaiah 56 verse three, the last verse of that prophecy. It says, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned every one to his own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. We are the stray sheep that need redemption. We are the ones that are lost without hope, never gonna find our way back. I don't know if you know this about sheep, sheep are very dumb, like very dumb. And this is what the Bible calls us, all we like sheep have gone astray. When sheep go astray, there ain't coming back. Sheep just kind of, like you know, you might've heard of like squirreling out, like you're just looking around and you're like, squirrel, and you go that way, okay? That's a sheep's whole existence, okay? That's a sheep's whole existence.

And says, all we like sheep have gone astray. Except, we're different than sheep, and the metaphor kind of breaks down here. When we go astray, it's because we are desperate for love. When we go astray, it's because we're looking for love in all the wrong places. When we go astray, it's not just because we got distracted. It's not just because a squirrel came across our path. Or just because we saw some other sheep doing something and we went after them. It's because we are looking to fill something inside of us that is not filled. It's because we are desperate for love. And because of that, because we were desperate for love, Jesus needed to do something that nobody else wanted to do.

And here's kind of the dark side of Christmas, right? Here's the dark side of even Luke one and two. In Luke 1:79, Zechariah is talking about Jesus and he's doing this whole long poem and it's super great. And so he says that Jesus is going to give light. He's gonna be light. And we love talking about Christmas being light. Light, we have light strung up here, we love it, right? Light is kind of this picture of Christmas. To whom is Jesus going to give light? People in darkness, us.

Whenever Jesus came, he's gonna bring peace. He's gonna usher in peace in this new way. To whom? People at war with God. Just didn't need to bring peace if we weren't at war. He didn't need to bring light if we weren't in darkness. We looked at Simeon a couple of weeks ago. Steve Beckwith helped us kind of envision Simeon in the temple, right? Simeon, he saw Jesus and he's like, this is the Christ. This is the Messiah, the one who I was waiting for, okay? Let me hold him, right, and his wife is saying, no, Simeon, don't, just calm down. We don't know if his wife was there, but it's pretty funny. But what does he say? What does he say in Luke 2? He says, Behold, this child is appointed for what? The fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed. That's dark. A sign that's opposed. Why? Why is it opposed? So that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. Jesus came to earth to show us our sin

and to say I've got something better. That this isn't the end. The sacrificial love is what we celebrate at Christmas. And this is our fourth Advent. This is love. This baby in an animal trough, in a storage bed, in Itasca. This sacrificial love is for us. And it is given freely to us when we believe. And so as we, I'm gonna call worship band up, as we kind of enter into a time of reflection and response, I just, I wanna encourage you, man, we got Christmas Eve stuff happening. Like my mind is spinning, we got a Christmas Eve service. It's gonna be great.

I'm thinking about the next morning, whenever we're giving gifts. And all that is still kind of there. It's all there. My encouragement to you is just take a moment right here and just put that on the back burner, okay? Don't worry, you're not gonna forget to bring the fruitcake to your aunt's house, okay? Don't worry about that. I know, you got the to-do's going, I get it. Take a second right now and just inhale, exhale, just breathe.

And just know that the sacrificial love of Jesus Jesus is what we are celebrating now, today, tomorrow. So let's celebrate it in prayer. Let's celebrate it as we sing. Let's celebrate it in response. Let's pray now. Jesus, thank you for all the ways that you are, all the ways that you're making us ready, the ways that you're helping us anticipate the good things that you are bringing, Christmas presents but more. This trust in you that we can trust that you are a good father, that you will give good gifts. Help us to feel that at Christmas time. Help us to see it all the more. Let it sink in that you are a good father giving us good gifts. Help us to trust you in the midst of it when it doesn't seem like like life's that good. I pray that Christmas would be a reminder that life in you is a good thing. That's your name that we pray. Amen. Would you please stand?