Every year, much of the world celebrates Christmas without really understanding why. We’ve done a great job of perpetuating the “what” and the “how” of Christmas. Even though we lament the fact that Christmas has lost a lot of its meaning, at least in this country, almost everyone, regardless of their faith or religion, knows at least the basic facts about the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem over 2,000 years ago.
But when we celebrate the birth of a Messiah to a poor, unmarried young couple in a stall in the midst of a bustling Middle East city with fruitcake, pine trees, shopping sprees and inflatable lawn creatures made in China by laborers who aren’t even permitted to celebrate Christmas that’s a pretty good indication that we’ve missed out on the “why” of Christmas.
If you were to ask people why we need Christmas, you would get all kinds of different answers:
• Retailers need Christmas because how much they sell at Christmas basically makes or breaks their year. Last year Americans spent over $154 billion on everything from candy canes to Christmas cards and even though projections are that we will spend slightly less per person this year, the numbers are still staggering.
• Ask kids why they need Christmas and they’ll tell you that they need a break from school and a time to get some really great stuff.
• Some people will claim that we need Christmas because it’s a time of peace and goodwill. And then they head to the mall to fight with someone else over the last of this year’s hottest toy or they curse the traffic that they find themselves in.
• Even churches say they need Christmas because it is a time when people are more willing to focus on spiritual matters.
But, as we might expect, Jesus very clearly told us why we need Christmas in just one sentence:
For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:20 (NIV)
My guess is that most of you are pretty surprised that I would use that verse as the main passage for my Christmas message this morning. Where’s the trek to Bethlehem? Where’s the manger? How about the angels and the shepherds? What about the wise men? Those are all important but in that one sentence, Jesus very clearly establishes for us something even more essential - why we need Christmas.
But we’re not going to totally ignore tradition this morning. In fact, we find a hint about these words that Jesus would speak in the Sermon on the Mount 30 years later as part of the Christmas narrative in Matthew Chapter 1. After Joseph discovered that Mary was pregnant, he was ready to divorce her in order to protect Mary from public disgrace, but an angel appeared to Joseph and spoke these words:
She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."
Matthew 1:21 (NIV)
Today, when we name our children, we use many different methods of picking out names. For instance, when our daughter was born, we chose the name Pamela for several reasons. We had a very good friend with that name, but we also liked the meaning of the name as well. The name means “honey” or “sweetness” and we had high hopes that she would turn out to live up to that name. We also picked the middle name “Renee”, which means reborn, to reflect our hope that she would one day experience the new birth through faith in Jesus Christ.
Our son, Peter James, was named after two Biblical figures, but Peter was also my grandfather’s name. The name Peter, as most of us know from our knowledge of the Scriptures, means “rock” and it was our desire that Pete would become a spiritual rock. It also became a prophetic description of his head, which turned out to be a very good thing considering how many times he landed on it during his childhood.
In Jesus’ day, names were even more important than they are today. Throughout the Bible we find that names often reflected the character of the person. Although the name Jesus is very popular among the Latino culture, it is not very common in our Anglo culture today. However, it was actually a very common name at the time when Jesus was born. The name is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew name “Joshua”, which means “God saves.” And God made it very clear that was the name which was to be given to Mary’s child because it reflected His life purpose. In order for us to understand that purpose better, let’s go back to our passage for this morning and read it out loud together:
For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:20 (NIV)
I don’t think we can fully appreciate just how radical of a statement this was. Because we’re familiar with the New Testament and Jesus’ frequent confrontations with and condemnations of the scribes and Pharisees, we tend to look a little less favorably on those groups than did the people that Jesus was speaking to. Most people looked up to these men as examples of what it meant to lead a righteous life. In fact, the Jews had a saying, "If only two people go to heaven, one will be a scribe and the other a Pharisee."
So when Jesus proclaimed that not even the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees was adequate enough for them to enter into the kingdom of heaven, it must have been quite a shock to those who were listening to Jesus. They had to be thinking to themselves, “If not even the scribes and the Pharisees can make it to heaven, what possible hope is there for us?”
But God had already answered that question when He spoke to Joseph about the birth of Jesus:
She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."
Matthew 1:21 (NIV)
Christmas provides us with the hope that it is indeed possible to enter the kingdom of heaven. When Jesus came to earth that very first Christmas, He came to provide a way for us to obtain a righteousness that is greater than that of the scribes and Pharisees and which therefore enables to enter into a relationship with God within the sphere if his kingdom. We need Christmas because, in the act of becoming human, Jesus provided us with everything that we needed to acquire that righteousness.
WHY WE NEED CHRISTMAS:
By coming here to earth as a man, Jesus fulfilled each of these necessary requirements in order to save us from our sins:
1. We need Jesus to show us what God is like
In his gospel, John describes the process of God leaving heaven and putting on a body so that He could more fully reveal Himself to us:
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
John 1:14 (NIV)
The phrase “made his dwelling” could literally be translated “tabernacled.” There seems to be a reference here to the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles. During that feast, the Jewish people lived in tabernacles, or temporary shelters, in order to remember God’s provision of shelter to them while they sojourned in the wilderness. It seems that John chose to use this specific word because there are several accounts in Scripture that appear to associate the birth of Jesus with that Jewish feast.
Historical records show that the celebration of the birth of Jesus was not an important observance in the early church, because there was much more focus on His death and resurrection. The date of December 25 wasn’t officially established until an edict of Pope Julius I in 350 AD. But it is almost certain that Jesus was not born on December 25. Although we don’t have time to go into all the evidence this morning, there are several things in the Scriptural accounts of the birth of Jesus that make it likely that Jesus was actually born in September or October during the Feast of Tabernacles.
• It is much more likely the shepherds would have been in the fields at that time of year.
• The information in Luke chapter 1 concerning Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist and his priestly service in the Temple also point to a date around that time.
• Since the Feast of Tabernacles was one of the Jewish Feasts that also required all able bodied men to travel to Jerusalem, that would also explain why Bethlehem, only 5 miles away, was so crowded.
• The manger and the swaddling cloths may also have ties to the Feast.
• The Feast of Tabernacles is also known as “The Season of our Joy” and “The Feast of the Nations.” Remember the words of the angel to the shepherds in Luke 2:10:
"Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.
But regardless of the actual date of Jesus’ birth, it is clear from the Scripture that He came to live here temporarily in order to save His people from their sins. And the first step in that process was to reveal the nature of God to us. Jesus made that quite obvious in a conversation he had with Philip right before his crucifixion:
Jesus answered: "Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ’Show us the Father’?
John 14:9 (NIV)
When Jesus came to this earth and lived a sinless life, he demonstrated in person the righteousness of God. This classic “Rest of the Story” broadcast from helps to illustrate how Jesus did that.
Illustration: Paul Harvey – “The Rest of the Story” – “The Man and the Birds” (audio)
Jesus became one of us so that we could see what God is like, but that is just the first aspect of why we need Christmas.
2. We need Jesus to show us what we are like
When Jesus proclaimed that even the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees was inadequate to secure a place in the kingdom of heaven, it was quite a shock to His listeners. But once we see in Jesus what God is like, it is pretty easy to see why the righteousness of any man, even that of the top religious leaders of the day, falls so far short of what God is like.
Throughout the New Testament, and especially in John’s gospel, Jesus is often pictured as light. As light, Jesus came into the world to expose the darkness of the sin in our lives and to show us what we’re really like. Here is how John begins His introduction of Jesus near the beginning of his gospel:
In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.
John 1:4, 5 (NIV)
Early in His ministry, Jesus gave us a little more insight into these words of John in his conversation with Nicodemus:
This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."
John 3:19-21 (NIV)
We need Christmas because we needed Jesus to come into this world as light in order to reveal what we’re really like. When Jesus shines His light into our lives, He illuminates our lives so that we can see all the sin that has been concealed in the darkness.
Back in the days before electricity, a tightfisted old farmer was taking his hired man to task for carrying a lighted lantern when he went to call on his best girl. "Why," he exclaimed, "when I went a-courtin’ I never carried one of them things. I always went in the dark." "Yes," the hired man said wryly," and look what you got!"
In his letter to the Romans, Paul quoted Old Testament Scripture to show what the light of Jesus reveals in our lives:
As it is written: "There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one."
Romans 3:10-12 (NIV)
And then, near the end of that chapter, Paul summarized his point with these familiar words:
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
Romans 3:23 (NIV)
Even though, as Paul clearly demonstrates, the Old Testament unmistakably taught that no one could even approach the righteousness of God, it took Jesus coming to this earth and “tabernacling” with us for us to fully understand that principle. As Jesus lived a perfect, sinless life, he shined His light into the darkness of our lives so that we could see our desperate condition.
But we need Christmas for more that just having Jesus reveal to us the perfect nature of God and how that contrasts with our own sinful nature. We need Christmas because...
3. We need Jesus to fulfill God’s plan
Over this last year in our journey through Ephesians, one thing that has become abundantly clear is that God’s plan from the beginning of time was that one day He would send His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to this earth for the purpose of saving us from our sins. Because he is omniscient, God knew before He ever created the first man that all of us would sin and that sin would separate us from a relationship with a perfect, holy God. In Ephesians chapter 3, we saw that God established this plan in eternity past:
His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Ephesians 3:10, 11 (NIV)
Notice that it was God’s eternal purpose to accomplish all His plans for us through His Son. And those plans most certainly included His plans to save us from our sins. But it was not just Paul who wrote about God’s eternal plan. Consider these words of Peter:
For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
1 Peter 1:18-20 (NIV)
Again, we see that Christmas was God’s idea, even before the creation of the world. Jesus came into this world at just the time God had planned in ages past in order to bridge the great divide that separated us from a perfect, holy God. Let’s look at one last passage that confirms this principle that the coming of Jesus to this earth was the perfect fulfillment of God’s plan to save us from our sins:
So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons.
Galatians 4:3-5 (NIV)
Notice the phrase “when the time had fully come...” I could follow the lead of many others and speculate on why Jesus was born exactly when He was. Certainly there were Biblical, cultural and political developments that we can look at from a human perspective and surmise that conditions were just right. But the main reason that it was the right time is because that is exactly what God had planned before the creation of the world.
God, in His infinite wisdom, could have created any plan that he wanted to provide a way for us to be saved from our sins. But in spite of those who would claim that there are many ways for us to have a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees and thus make us eligible for the kingdom of heaven, the Bible makes it clear that there is only one plan, the plan we call Christmas. Not the Christmas of giving and receiving gifts. Not the Christmas of peace and goodwill toward men. Certainly not the Christmas that is driven by the consumerism of our culture. Not even the Christmas that celebrates the birth of a baby in manger over 2,000 years ago.
The Christmas that provides a way for us to be made more righteous than the scribes and Pharisees and makes us eligible to enter the kingdom of heaven is the Christmas that recognizes Jesus as the one who came to this earth so that we could see what God is like. It is the Christmas that allows Jesus to shine light into the darkness of our lives so that we can see what we’re really like. And it is the Christmas that is the fulfillment of God’s plan to save us from our sins. That leads us directly to the last reason we need Christmas.
4. We need Jesus to save us from our sins
Christmas is really only the beginning of the story and in order for us to understand why we need Christmas so much, we must, as Paul Harvey would encourage us to do, look to the “rest of the story.”
That little baby who was born and laid in a manger that first Christmas, grew up and lived a sinless life. At about the age of 30, He began his public ministry, which was cut short about 3-1/2 years later when He was put to death on a cross. To many who observed the crucifixion that day, it didn’t seem any more significant than any of the rest of the crucifixions that were quite common in the Roman Empire of that era. But when Jesus rose from the dead three days later, He confirmed that His death and resurrection had eternal implications, not just for those present at the first Christmas, not even just for those who witnessed His death and resurrection, but for you and me as well. The apostle Paul described the significance of the “rest of the story.”
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
2 Corinthians 5:21 (NIV)
That day when Jesus hung on the cross, God took all of our sin and placed it on His Son. And when Jesus dies on the cross, he paid the penalty for that sin and He gave to us the righteousness of God – the only kind of righteousness that cold ever surpass that of the scribes and Pharisees. And in doing so, He fulfilled the words of the angel to Joseph:
...you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.
I would be remiss this morning if I just stopped at this point, because Christmas requires much more than just some intellectual knowledge of why we need Christmas. Once we know why we need Christmas, all of us come face to face with a decision about what we’ll do with Christmas.
WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH CHRISTMAS?
When Jesus came to earth that very first Christmas he allowed us to see what God is like and what we’re like and he fulfilled God’s plan to save us from our sins. But that plan is just like all the Christmas presents we’ll get in the next few days. Unless I receive that gift, it won’t do me any good. Although God makes His gift available for all, that gift is only useful to those who receive it in the manner that God has determined.
Several of the passages that we have looked at this morning have already given us some hints about how we receive that gift. They have also very clearly eliminated many of the ways that some of us have tried to be made right with God and receive that gift:
• I can’t receive the gift based on my good works. If the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees wasn’t adequate, then I know I’m not even close.
• I can’t receive the gift based on my religion. Although going to church, giving my tithes and offerings and ministering within the body are all things that are commanded of those who are followers of Jesus Christ, none of them will save me from my sins.
• I can’t receive the gift based on my sincerity. No matter how sincere you are in your beliefs, if you are relying upon anything other than birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ you cannot be saved from your sins.
You’ll notice that all of the things I just mentioned are based on something about me and what I can do – my works, my religion, my sincerity. But Christmas, even for those who miss its deepest meaning, isn’t about what I can do to earn my gifts. Although we fret at this time of year about whether we’ve been naughty or nice, the fact is that we usually receive gifts regardless of which list we’re on. That’s the very definition of a gift – if it was something we earned, it wasn’t a gift.
Let me illustrate with this cartoon. In case you can’t read the note, here is what it says:: ’Dear Santa, if you leave a new bike under the tree, I will give you the antidote to the poison I put in the milk. Timmy.’ Now Timmy might get that bike, but it wouldn’t be a gift, would it?
So how do we receive this gift that God provided for us through Christmas? Let’s go back one last time to the first chapter of John’s gospel:
Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
John 1:12, 13 (NIV)
John presents us with two conditions that we must satisfy before we can receive the gift of eternal life:
• I must receive Jesus.
Jesus will not force His way into our lives. In fact, the previous verses in the first chapter of John make it clear that even though Jesus came as the light of the world, many chose to hold onto their darkness rather than allow the light into their lives. Receiving Jesus into my life means that I give him unhindered access to every area of my life so that He can clean out the darkness and replace it with light. In other words, I must agree to let Jesus be the master of my life.
• I must believe in the name of Jesus
We’ve already seen this morning that the name Jesus was more than just a title. It represented His very nature – God saves. So believing in the name of Jesus means that I place all my trust in Jesus, acknowledging that he is the only One who can save me from my sins. I trust in His life, death, and resurrection alone as the way that I can be saved from my sins and restore my relationship with God.
