Introduction:
A. The story is told of 4 expectant fathers who, years ago, were in a hospital waiting room while their wives were in labor.
1. A nurse came in the room and announced to the first man, “congratulations, sir, you’re the father of twins.” What a coincidence,” the man said, “I work for the Minnesota Twins.”
2. In a little while, the nurse returned and said to a second man, “You, sir, are the father of triplets.” “Wow,” said the man, “What a coincidence, I work for 3M corporation.”
3. A few minutes later, the nurse came back. To the third man she announced that his wife had given birth to quadruplets. “Don’t tell me,” she asked, “Another coincidence?” Regaining his composure, the man said, “I don’t believe it, I work for the Four Seasons Hotel.”
4. After hearing this, everyone’s attention turned to the 4th man, who looked like he was about to faint. He said, “I should never have taken that job at 7-Eleven.”
B. Every birth has its share of surprises and wonder.
1. I have been blessed to witness the birth of all three of our daughters, and what an amazing and humbling experience that was.
2. God bless you ladies for what you undergo in that process! Amen!
3. Praise God for the miracle of reproduction (conception, gestation, and delivery)!
4. As filled with joy and pride as we parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles are when a baby is born into our families, just think how God felt that day when His One and Only Son was born.
C. In our sermon series, “Devoted To Jesus,” we have been trying to see Jesus more clearly, understand Him more deeply, and follow Him more completely.
1. We have tried to understand something of His eternal qualities (Alive before His earthly life).
2. Last week we wrestled with the question, “Why was Jesus Jewish?” Why did God choose to bring Jesus into the world through the Jewish people at that time and place in history?
D. Today we want to take another look at the birth of Jesus.
1. One of the challenges we face is familiarity. We all know the story, right?
2. We’ve seen hundreds, if not thousands, of Christmas cards, and manger scenes.
3. We’ve sung the carols of His birth and scene the Christmas specials on TV.
4. So how can we look afresh at this well-known story?
5. We need to return to the text, and try to put ourselves into that time and place.
6. We need to realize that these were real people, no different from you and me.
7. As glorious and wonderful as this event is to us, it was a troubling and complicating one for them.
I. The Story
A. Picture a young couple in their mid to late teens, living in Nazareth of Galilee.
1. They are both from common backgrounds, and their families have probably known each other all their lives.
2. Unlike our modern romance and courtship experiences, their marriage had probably been pre-arranged by their parents many years earlier.
3. But, none the less, Joseph and Mary were excited about their engagement and looking forward to their wedding.
4. Both were spiritual people; faithful Jews; upstanding citizens, by every indication.
5. So into this happy and idyllic picture comes a surprise; an unexpected intrusion.
B. Luke 1:26ff tells this part of the story.
1. In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." (Luke 1:26-28)
2. This kind of thing has never happened to me before, and my guess is that it has never happened to you either. Nor had it ever happened to Mary before.
3. So we can understand why Mary was greatly troubled by this experience. She was terrified.
4. That’s why the angel proceeded to say to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. 31You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end." (Luke 1:30-33)
5. Wow, Mary thinks! I’m going to have a baby boy, and He is going to be a King!
6. But wait a minute, She remembered an important point, “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” (Lk. 1:34)
7. The angel answered her question, saying, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. 36Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. 37For nothing is impossible with God.” (Lk. 1:35-37)
8. Mary’s reply is so mature, “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.” (Lk. 1:38)
C. If you were Mary, what would you do now?
1. You are a virgin…you are engaged…and you are miraculously pregnant.
2. Do you confide in your mother? Will she believe you?
3. Do you confide in your fiancé? Will he believe you?
4. Will anyone who hears the story believe you?
D. In our times, where each year a million teenage girls get pregnant out of wedlock, Mary’s predicament has undoubtedly lost some of its force.
1. But in that closely knit Jewish community in the first century, an unwed mother was not only unwelcome, but unlikely.
2. The law regarded an engaged women who became pregnant as an adulteress, subject to death by stoning. Most didn’t get pregnant out of wedlock, and those who did, did live long.
E. Mary had to tell Joseph, and she did.
1. The Bible does not record for us that encounter, but I’m sure it must have been heart-breaking.
2. Joseph loved Mary, and wanted to believe her, but how could he believe such a story?
3. And even if he believed her, how could they live under the weight of community suspicion and rejection?
4. I’m sure Joseph talked with his parents, perhaps his rabbi, or other respected friends.
5. Joseph faced the hardest decision he had faced in his young life, and maybe the hardest decision he would ever have to face.
F. Matthew tells us the decision that Joseph made.
1. “Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.” (Matthew 1:19)
2. So Joseph’s decision was to not press charges, but to let her go, and to do so drawing as little attention to it as possible.
3. As you know, God intervened by sending an angel with a message for Joseph, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” (Mt. 1:20-21)
4. What did Joseph do? The Bible says, “When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.” (Mt. 1:24-25)
G. So Joseph obeyed the Lord and went ahead and took Mary as his wife.
1. We don’t know how quickly the wedding took place, nor whether they did so with a private affair rather than a public one.
2. But we do know that when the time neared for Jesus to be born, Joseph did not want to leave Mary home.
3. When the census forced him to return to register at Bethlehem, his hometown, Joseph took the very pregnant Mary with him on the trip.
4. When they finally arrived, all the rooms in the inn were taken, and all that was left for them was a stall in the stable.
5. Luke tells us, “While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.” (Lk. 2:6-7)
H That night, angels appeared to shepherds out in the fields surrounding Bethlehem.
1. The angels told them the good news about the birth of Jesus the Savior who is Christ the Lord.
2. The shepherds hurried off to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph and the baby who was lying in a manger.
3. Then the shepherds spread the word and everyone who heard about it was amazed.
I. The Bible tells us, “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. 22When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord 23(as it is written in the Law of the Lord, ‘Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord’), 24and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: ‘a pair of doves or two young pigeons.’” (Lk. 2:21-24)
1. As Joseph and Mary were in the temple taking care of these things, an old man named Simeon, who had been told that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah, saw them and recognized that their baby, Jesus, was the long-awaited for Messiah.
2. “Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying: 29’Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. 30For my eyes have seen your salvation, 31which you have prepared in the sight of all people, 32a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel…This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, 35so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too.’” (Lk. 2:29-35)
3. If that weren’t enough fanfare and confirmation, an 84 year-old widow, Anna, a prophetess who spent all her time at the temple, worshipping day and night, also came up to them and gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.
J. Some time later, Magi from the East, led by the star, paid them a visit, as recorded in Matthew 2.
1. “On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.” (Mt. 2:11-12)
2. And following that visit the Bible says, “13When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. ‘Get up,’ he said, ‘take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.’ 14So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘Out of Egypt I called my son.’” (Mt. 2:13-15)
L. I hope that this brief review of the story of Jesus’ birth has given you new insight into the lives and times of these people.
1. The facts of this story, rhymed in carols, recited by children in church plays, illustrated on cards, have become so familiar that it is easy to miss the message behind the facts.
II. The Significance
A. What do we learn from the birth of Christ? Certainly the lessons are countless!
1. Let me suggest a few.
B. First, we learn something of the humility and courage of God.
1. I can’t help but marvel at the humble circumstances into which Jesus was born.
2. He could have chosen to be born in a palace, with opulent jewels and gold, but he chose to be born in a barn into a poor, peasant family.
3. Paul said it well in Philippians 2, He “made himself nothing…he humbled himself.” (2:7-8)
4. Our Messiah, the King of Kings, showed up wearing a different kind of glory – the glory of humility.
5. Our great God, the only real God, who made all things and could order armies and empires about like pawns on a chessboard, showed up in Palestine as a baby who could not speak or eat solid food or control his bladder, who depended on two teenagers for shelter, food and love.
6. It took humility and courage for God to lay aside power and glory to come in such humble and scandalous beginnings.
7. It took humility and courage to come to this planet knowing the hatred and violence that lay ahead.
8. It took humility and courage to place himself in the arms of that young poor couple from Nazareth.
9. We might judge that a foolhardy thing to do, but God knew what He was doing!
C. Second, we learn something of the faith that is required on our part.
1. The whole story of Jesus is hard to believe, but is there anything harder to believe than the virgin conception?
2. In Philip Yancy’s chapter on the birth of Jesus, he alludes to an episode from the TV show Thirtysomething, which was a show that Diana and I enjoyed watching.
a. I don’t remember this episode, but it showed Hope, a Christian, arguing with her Jewish husband, Michael about the holidays.
b. She said, “Why do you even bother with Hanukkah? Do you really believe a handful of Jews held off a huge army by using a bunch of lamps that miraculously wouldn’t run out of oil?”
c. Michael countered, “Oh, and Christmas makes more sense? Do you really believe an angel appeared to some teenage girl who then got pregnant without ever having sex and traveled on horseback to Bethlehem where she spent the night in a barn and had a baby who turned out to be the Savoir of the world?”
3. It truly is a story that is hard to believe – The invisible God of the universe plants himself in the womb of a virgin woman. The eternal becomes temporal; the infinite becomes finite; the Word who was from the beginning and created all things, became flesh.
4. It is so hard to believe that many so called Christians, have abandoned any miraculous aspect of the story of Jesus – His birth, His miracles, His resurrection.
5. But to throw out the virgin birth is to pull the foundation from everything the Bible says about Jesus.
6. To throw out the virgin birth is to reject Christ’s deity, and to reject the infallibility and authority of the Bible.
7. If we cannot believe the story of Jesus’ birth, then how can we believe the rest of what the Bible tells us about Jesus.
8. Yes, it requires faith to believe the virgin birth, but everything about God requires faith.
9. Paul said, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith…” (Eph. 2:8)
D. Third, We learn something of the obedience that is required in following God.
1. Every time I consider what Joseph and Mary had to do, I marvel at their obedience.
2. Following and obeying God is usually not an easy nor a convenient thing.
3. Mary’s attitude, “I am the Lord’s servant,” is so convicting to me.
4. Mary and Joseph were the first people to accept Jesus on His own terms, regardless of the personal cost.
5. But in reality, that is the only way that anyone can accept Jesus – it has to be on His terms.
6. God is God. He offers the covenant. There is no negotiation.
7. Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. 24For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.” (Luke 9:23-24)
8. Obeying God requires our whole heart, mind, soul and strength.
9. Although we may try to find the easy path of obedience, in the end there is no such thing.
10. Jesus said, “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it…Not everyone who says to me, ’Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Mt. 7:13,14,21)
11. It’s God’s way, or no way. Obedience (like batteries) is required.
E. Finally, we learn something of our great need.
1. Jesus came as our Savior; to save us from our sins.
2. He didn’t come because HE needed something. He came because WE needed something.
3. If any of us do not recognize our need, then we are truly blind and utterly lost.
4. It is the recognition of our need that will turn us toward our Savior.
F. Let me leave you with the words to this song – “He Left It All” by Charlotte Stere
He left the streets of Heaven…to walk this weary earth,
He left the Father’s richest…for those of little worth.
He left the praise of angels…for earthly hate and scorn,
The company of Heaven…to wander here forlorn.
He left the crown of glory…to hang upon a tree,
He left the Heavenly mansions…to die for you and me.
He left it all, dear sinner…because He loved us so,
That whosever cometh…His perfect peace may know.
He left it all behind Him…for sin and death and shame,
That we might dwell forever…with Him, O praise His name.
G. Do you recognize your need?
1. Do you see what Jesus did to take care of it?
2. Will you accept the gift of salvation and serve your Savior for the rest of your life?
3. Praise God Jesus was born of a virgin to be our Savior!
