Expect The Unexpected

What do you expect on Christmas Day?

For many years our family did much the same thing.

All kids we would wake up early in the morning, even my sister who was normally a sleepy head.

We expected gifts under the tree, so we’d rush out to the Christmas tree to make sure they were there.

Then persuade mum and dad to get out of bad.

We’d open our gifts.

Then go to church, because that is what is expected.

Then come home and get dressed in something comfortable but good, jump in the car for a 45 minute trip to have lunch with one bunch of the relatives.

We always expected our aunty to bring the beetroot.

And we always expected her to be late.

And we always expected dad to eat too much.

and to play cricket.

After lunch and some gift sharing we would jump in the car and drive around 45 minutes in another direction to meet up with a different group of relatives...

And again we expected there to be plenty of food and more gifts.

What are you expecting at Christmas?

Special food. A lot of food. Perhaps you are someone who expects not too much in the way of food at Christms.

Presents. Particular types of presents from particualr types of people.

Maybe you expect families to get together. Or perhaps you expect to be seperated from your family.

Maybe you look forward to Christmas Day being a day of rest.

At Christmas we all expect things.

Christmas is really about God’s story of God coming into our world.

And we have expectations of God.

Who God is and who God will be in our lives!!

What are your expectations of God?

Who do you think God is?

If I was to ask you to describe God in one page or to paint of a picture that resembled him, what would it look like?

Would it look like how God has been active throughout history?

The story of Christmas highlights that we should expect the unexpected from God.

Even at church during Christmas we expect to hear a familiar story.

So imagine the faces on the congregation and his mum, when one of the children in a Christmas play decided to show some initiative.

Mary and Joseph had just approached the innkeeper for a room and he replied no.

The child playing the innkeeper however wasn’t quite happy with the answer he was supposed to give and so continued…

Look we have no rooms left, but you can have mine, so long as you leave the donkey outside and tell mum that you made all the mess.

That young innkeeper, surprised everyone at Christmas.

And the story of Christmas is how God begins to surprise everyone.

Luke chapter 2 is one of the accounts of Jesus birth and in this account we see some things that highlight we should expect the unexpected.

In Luke 2:1-6,

we see that God chose an inconvenient place for Jesus to enter the world.

Keep in mind Mary was pregnant.

Now gentlemen if you were God, do you think it would be a good idea to send a pregnant women 70 miles or around 112 kilometres walking or on the back of a donkey?

Ladies if you were pregenant would you like doing it?

This is exactly what God did.

Jesus wasn’t even born in His own town,

there would have been few friends around.

And God can often do things that appear to us to be inconvienent.

But often there is a good reason behind it.

In Luke 2:7,

we discover that place wasn’t even fancy, it was probably a little uncomfortable.

It was out the back of the hotel, a stable.

If Prince Frederick and Princess Mary (of Denmark) announced they were coming to Burnie/Devonport/Launceston with their children during a busy time…

Do you think they would be happy to stay in the mayor’s back shed, because everything is booked out. Would you?

Probably not.

But for God he chose to enter this world by being born in a stable.

Amongst the animals, mate if you have ever been to a show and taken yoru children through the animal enclosures you get a good idea what that would have smelt like

Think about it for a moment if God was born in a stable, then it was possible for even Him to be visited by farm workers.

That highlights something about God…

He is accessible to all people.

No matter who you are, God is accessible.

Now in Luke 2:8-20, we see God chose an unusual group of people to be the first to see Jesus.

Not only this they were responsible for sharing the fact that in Jesus God had come into this world.

He chose shepherds people who were not well respected, who society often shunned.