XHOPE
December 21, 2008
Xmas – many people are offended by the X in Xmas
X represents the first letter in the Greek name of Christ
Today I entitled my sermon XHOPE – because Christ adds so much to our hope that we have that I have been talking about the last few weeks
Christ makes our hope something more than just a theory – He makes it tangible, he makes it real. God, through the OT prophets talks of a hope – Christ embodied that hope. His birth makes Hope real. His birth teaches us things about God that we would perhaps know in theory, but would be lacking in a definitive way.
Many concepts of God
• Creator who is uninvolved in creation
• God who is too good for us – cannot be in the presence of evil
• God who is a force – not a personal being
The whole Bible reveals to us who God is but there are some specific realities of this God reveled in the birth of Jesus
Reveals a God …
Who is alive
Not just a force out there
He is a personal God
Not a human being although he became a human being, but there is a life to him similar to our lives
We were created in God’s image
Not a computer giving you information
So many help features are impersonal
Press one for this, two for that
God is alive - a person
One church I read about put on a Christmas program that included a manger scene with their children...
*There was a little 5-year-old boy on the drama team...
-I think he was a shepherd that year...
--And I know he was energetic to say the least!
*This little boy was a handful
-During rehearsals he was all over the place...
-He distracted everyone...
--And turned the director into a nervous wreck!
*She was really worried about how he would do during the performance.
*At rehearsal all week, they had used a baby doll for baby Jesus...
-But during the play, the couple playing Joseph & Mary put their own baby in the manger...
--And our little shepherd didn’t know it.
*During the play, he started edging over to the manger...
-Suddenly he saw that it was a real, live baby...
-And he shouted out: --He’s alive!
OT God is talking
Creation – let us make men…
To the early Patriarchs – Moses, Abraham, Noah
To the prophets – Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel
But in the birth of Christ God gave himself a voice that all could hear
He spoke, he interacted with people
John seems to be especially taken by the fact God in Jesus Christ was someone he talked to, someone who interacted with people. God was not just some far off concept – he was a real person.
1 John 1:1-2
We write you now about what has always existed, which we have heard, we have seen with our own eyes, we have looked at, and we have touched with our hands. We write to you about the Word that gives life. He who gives life was shown to us. We saw him and can give proof about it. And now we announce to you that he has life that continues forever. He was with God the Father and was shown to us.
NCV
XMAS reveals a God who is living, who is like us in that he interacts, that he has personality, that he is not just an impersonal force out there. This changes everything. This is a God who we can talk to. This is a God who hears, who feels, who in many ways is like us. XMAS reveal a God that we can actually know.
Who is caring
No obligation to come to earth
It was not a good trip.
It was a sacrifice to come to earth.
Philippians 2: 6-8
He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.
Message
Jesus was born to die. His destiny was predetermined. This was part of the plan. When he consented to be born, he consented to live as a human, which was humbling, but he also consented to give his life in a most painful way. And he did that so that we could escape God’s wrath.
Romans 5:7-8
Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.
8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
As we look at the baby Jesus we see the care and love that God has for us.
This is not a God who has no compassion. Not a God who sees us in danger and sits by and does nothing.
XMAS reveals a God who will do whatever to takes to save us.
This is a unique feature of the Christian religion.
A man from China who was converted to Christ told this story: A man fell into a dark, slimy pit. He tried to climb out of the pit, but he couldn’t. Confucius came along, saw the man and said, “Poor fellow, had he listened to me, he never would have gotten there,” and he went on. Buddha came along and saw the man in the pit and said, “Poor fellow, if he’ll come up here, I’ll help him,” and he too kept on walking. Then Jesus Christ came along and said, “Poor fellow.” And then he jumped down into the pit and lifted him out.
That heaven is a place that is real
In Jesus we have someone who has been where we want to be and his coming reaffirms that there really is a place called heaven.
The Bible makes some incredible claims
That there is a God whom we can’t see
That there is this place called heaven where God dwells and where he wants us to be with Him
All of these must be taken by faith, we hope these are true
But because Jesus came we now have someone who has been there
John 1:18
No one has ever seen God. The only Son, who is truly God and is closest to the Father, has shown us what God is like.
CEV
John 14: 1 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.
2 In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you.
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
In John’s Gospel Jesus speaks often of himself as being sent – that he was someone else and that he was sent here to earth
John 6:38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.
John 7: 28 “Yes, you know me, and you know where I am from. I am not here on my own, but he who sent me is true. You do not know him,
29 but I know him because I am from him and he sent me.”
Of course that somewhere else was heaven … Jesus has been there and can testify both to God’s existence and the existence of heaven.
Our hope is more real because we have someone who has been there
When Jesus came into the world we have an eyewitness of the glory and majesty of God
An eyewitness to the beauty and wonder of heaven
When you travel you sometimes ask someone else who has been there
Many from here have traveled to Boston/New England and have come to me to ask where to god, what to see – why? – because that’s where I’m from
We trust people who have been places
When we travel by car I sometimes like to stop at restaurants that I’ve never been to before
This sometimes is not a good idea because sometimes I’ve picked real losers
So, my daughters have established rules at what restaurants we can stop at. They have three criteria and any restaurant has to meet at least two of these:
1) It is a chain – so we can trust it
2) There are many cars in the parking lot – a place that has local appeal
3) Someone we know and trust has been there and has recommended that restaurant
Heaven may not be a chain, I’m not sure how many cars are in the lot – but when Jesus was born into this world we now have someone who has been there and recommends the place
One reason Jesus came to this earth is to reassure us that God is real, that heaven is a real place and more than anything God wants us to be with him forever.
I HOPE because God has cared about me enough to send his son down to us. To reveal to us who he is – a real, living being, a being who cares, who comes from aplce that is real. Because of Christmas IHOPE.
