Part 3 of 3 - On the Road to Bethlehem
Birthing a Miracle
3 part series… on the way to Bethlehem…
Mark spiritual encounter points as we prepare out hearts for the entrance of Jesus in powerful ways into our lives as we approach this Christmas!
Micah 5:1-5
1 Marshal your troops, O city of troops, for a siege is laid against us. They will strike Israel’s ruler on the cheek with a rod. 2 "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times." 3 Therefore Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor gives birth and the rest of his brothers return to join the Israelites. 4 He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth. 5 And he will be their peace.
Visiting Bethlehem again for the third time…
Our journey so far has been to find that first it is a place of burial… Genesis 35 where Rachel with a broken past and bitter sweet life was buried … representing how coming to Christ our old must die…
Then we found next week, a few 100 years later, 1000 years before Jesus is born… a young girl makes a commitment to her mother in law … and Ruth follows Naomi back to her home town, Bethlehem… and there her future is made… a love story, a royal story, an eternal story of God’s provision as Ruth meets Boaz, who’s line is king david, who’s line is Jesus the Christ… the messiah…
We serve a God who not only buries pasts but builds our future.
Now 300 years later, still 700 years before Christ… the next great mention of Bethlehem… 3rd great reference to this place, a place where miracles are birthed.
In Micah 5 we talk about the birthing miracle of the Christ. This would have been the passage herod’s wisemen would have come when talking to him about the WIsemen going to visit the messiah.
Telling him we believe the great champion and King of the Jews would come from Bethlehem…
700 years before the event Micah says, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, in a little insignificant town called Bethlehem, the one who will be the champion of Israel, and a champion of peace would come from here…
A bold declaration of the birthing of a miracle… God birthing a miracle for the sake of His people… a miracle always requires a problem, a crisis, an impossibility, and the miracle is a solution beyond man’s ability to make. This is what Micah Chapter 5 is all about…
Micah chapter 5 is about the siege and the shepherd…
Siege = problem, impossibility Jerusalem is facing
Shepherd = the miraculous solution
The Siege:
The siege is laid against us… the threat of the Asyrian army is coming down… just like many of us we feel like a siege is layed against us…
Siege: The groundwork for the need of a miracle.
Many of us come into the Christmas season, and anxiety, concern, family members, loved ones, friends, is on our hearts… and we feel a siege is laid against us…
5 Great people problems in America [Bill Hybels]
1. Relationships are not working
2. Consumption is not satisfying
3. Therapy is expensive
4. Heartbreak is universal
5. Escapism is the law of the land
We have never as a culture seen more addictions to escapism behavior… people are so under siege that the only thing that seems to help is escapism, selfish ,drown our sorrows or inability to cope, drug use, alcohol, excessive entertainment… to not have to think about the siege in our lives.
Maybe you don’t find yourself addicted to drugs this morning but maybe there are other things you need a miracle for… bad attitudes, bad choices, pushing away of people around you, anxiety, inability to manage your own time…
This is the context of a miracle… a crisis has occurred and a miracle is necessary…
The story of 2 guys…
Whose wives were going Christmas shopping…
So the two guys decide to go sailing… as they go out it gets colder and windy… and things get out of control… waves start coming into the boat… they struggle to get the boat back to shore… and have to both jump out on the sand bar… freezing cold… knee deep in mud, one guy turns to the other… “Sure beats shopping doesn’t it!”
One way to avoid the siege… change perspective___
If we aren’t escaping we ignore life and say “ah it could be worse”
When is it just enough to survive enough…
The great hope of Micah, of Bethlehem is more than just coping, or surviving, more than saying “ah, it could be worse” but change it to EXPECT a miracle…
Micah tells us a siege will come against us until … 3 Therefore Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor gives birth
Coming a day when someone in Bethlehem will go through labor and give birth to a shepherd… not a soldier who you might think you need in a siege… but a shepherd…
2 "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."
4 He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth.
No matter how bad the siege may be… we have a promise even 700 years before He comes… we have a shepherd…
3 things that come from having a good shepherd
Because we have a good shepherd… We can put the with God factor in place…
On the way to Bethlehem we can experience a miracle… in the midst of a siege happening to this world… a miracle is born that changes the tide…
2 "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."
In the celebration we come to this Christmas God has birthed a miracle in our lives… that He (Jesus) can walk with us through the siege upon the world… I am not alone in the crisis I face!
The Christian name of Jesus Immanuel, which means God with us…
Leads us to the “With God factor” … no matter what siege you may be in, no matter what complacency, comfortable stagnation… God is with us…
In life … sometimes it happens in such a way that it seems no one understands. No one else gets it… but there is a shepherd given for us… and this is that much more impressive when you look at the credentials of this guy…
It says in Micah… out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."
This miracle born in Bethlehem and represents God born In flesh… the God with us factor is so powerful, for He has no beginning and no end…
One day Jesus would stand in front of His critics… and say… Before Abraham was, I Am…
Jesus is the ultimate identity of all of history… the alpha and omega… wrapping up the totality of all of history… from ancient times… He is the I Am of all eternity…
Before your crises He was there, after it, He will be there, and during it He is there…
Micah, His origins are of old…
John 1:1 in the beginning was the WORD and word was GOD, and the word was with God… v.2 and the word was with God in the beginning.
Jesus is front ancient times, the beginning and the end.
Paul says in Col. 1:15-18
15 Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before God made anything at all and is supreme over all creation. F4 16 Christ is the one through whom God created everything in heaven and earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see – kings, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities. Everything has been created through him and for him. 17 He existed before everything else began, and he holds all creation together. 18 Christ is the head of the church, which is his body. He is the first of all who will rise from the dead, so he is first in everything.
He is the image (Jesus), what the invisible God looks like… and then he says Jesus is the first born of all creation… And He Jesus was before all things, and in Him all things hold together…
Micah says in the midst of the siege there will be born one who can help…
WHAT DOES THAT MEAN:
The measurements of His capacity is greater than measurements of your crisis…
The measurements of His wisdom…
He can see the big picture, because He is the big picture… He can see what we can’t … can do what we can’t…
And it is He, The one who Micah says can be born in the midst of our siege…
Nothing less than Immanuel…
God with us_The God Factor is in place______________
Where ever your feeling siege this Christmas season… the road to Bethlehem takes us to the place where a miracle is birthed for you and me… our miracle that starts with that kind of Christ born into our hearts and is now with you in your moment of crisis.
If you will trust Him… He is with you… He will never abandon you…
First… Because we have a good shepherd…
We can put the with God factor in place…
Second…
Because we have a good shepherd… We can exchange our vulnerability for God’s ability
4 He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.
Faith journey begins with this…
What am I going to focus on?
Focus on Christ’s ability(strength) rather than my vulnerability…
Faith is this way, will I focus on My vulnerability… or my Shepherds ability…
As I make decisions in life do I focus on my capacity for making things happen, or God’s capacity…
Sheep are unbelievably vulnerable…
not flattering that God calls us Sheep… but a great dose of reality… to realize our vulnerability
Sheep are not known for their high IQ even to manage their normal day in life…
Unique in the animal kingdom… God has not endowed them with any natural defenses… no plates of armor, no claws,
BECAUSE
Every one of us need the birthing of a miracle in our lives…
Am I going to trust in the character and capacity on God, or focus on the danger of my crisis… or deny the danger all together…
We have talked about the changed life… but it is also about the exchanged life… our old life is exchanged for new possibilities, a new future, exchanged for the life we did have or would have had if we had not chosen to follow the shepherd…
At the cross, Christ exchanges lives with us…
We give him our vulnerability for His victory
We give him our weakness and He gives us his strength.
We give him our unworthiness, for his worthiness
We give him our unrighteousness, for his righteousness…
The great exchange, I can live beyond my crisis… and can live with the resources of a shepherd that says I will never leave you nor forsake you…
I came all the way into this world to be born amidst your siege, to offer you the greatest exchange ever… the greatest rescue story…
ecause we have a shepherd… we can refuse to be paralyzed by uncertainty.
And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth. 5 And he will be their peace.
We can put the with God factor in place…
We can exchange our vulnerability for God’s ability
• Because we have a shepherd who leads us we are free to move and follow without being paralyzed by the unknown.
• A shepherd that brings us security and peace…
• So that we can step out and follow Him…
This holiday season we all need the miracle of the birth at Bethlehem… to be birthed in us… in the midst of our crisis, of our siege…
How we refuse to be paralyzed by uncertainty…
We focus on following the lead of the Spirit of our shepherd, rather than following our fears.
I worry about how many of us make our decisions based on our capacity, based on our fears…
Or we have a problem of perspective… and we are cold to the moving of God… we would rather talk to each other through worship, through the message, we would rather be frustrated about the things we like being changed instead of grabbing a hold of the spirit of God and say GOD WHAT DO YOU HAVE FOR ME NOW! WHAT DO YOU HAVE FOR US?
What might happen to us as a church if I could erase every uncertainty, every fear of peoples opinions, every spiritual insecurity, we could single handedly change this city for Jesus Christ…
If we started acting like we have a shepherd… that it is not my ability but His… it is not my vulnerability but the God factor is in place…
All of this with the reality that as we try different things in life, and step out in faith, even when it requires risk, that we might fail.
Ever think that maybe this moment you could learn something more through failure then through success?
Someone once said it would be better to be only 80% right but have done something about it, then 100% right and missed the moment of opportunity…
BECAUSE WEHEN YOU HAVE A SHEPHERD… A MIRACLE BIRTHED FOR YOU AND ME…
Because we have a good shepherd… We can put the with God factor in place… Because we have a good shepherd…
We can exchange our vulnerability for God’s ability
Because we have a shepherd…
we can refuse to be paralyzed by uncertainty.
Each of us need a miracle in our lives…
On the road to Bethlehem we have found a burial place… we have found a place where God builds our future… through small commitments right now … and we also find a birthing place… the birthing of a miracle…
The God factor for you… for me… not my inability or my capacity, but God’s ability and endless capacity to do exceedingly and abundantly more than what we could ask for or think…
Is God truly your security today… is He your peace? What is the miracle you need today… For He is here…
