The Truth of Christmas
Luke 2:1-21
Over the years Christmas has become so commercialized that today I would like to re examine the Biblical truth about the birth of our savior
a recent article I read on the CBS NEWS website said that Americans spend an average of 66 billion dollars on Christmas gifts each year,
The day after Thanksgiving is the official kick off of the Christmas shopping season .On Black Friday 2008 In Long Island New York 2000 people waited outside a Walmart Store for the doors to be unlocked at 5am. When the doors were opened there was a stampede to get inside that left one person dead and 4 others taken to the hospital. All in the spirit of Christmas
2000 years ago the Angels proclaimed Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among men
Yet, according to the National Institute of Health, Christmas is the time of year that people experience a high incidence of depression. Hospitals and police forces report high incidences of suicide and attempted suicide. Psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health professionals report a significant increase in patients complaining about depression. One North American survey reported that 45% of respondents dreaded the festive season. I had one attorney tell me that holidays are the busiest time of the year in her office because of parents fighting over visitation rights of their children
I want you to understand upfront that I'm not a scrooge. I enjoy Christmas and love giving gifts. If you ask my wife I actually enjoy giving gifts more than I like receiving them, I actually prefer buying my own gifts.
As a Christian I believe it is possible for us to enjoy the festivities of Christmas while at the same time be firmly grounded in the truth of Christmas found in the Bible
What has happened in our society is that we have so elevated the commercialism of Christmas and become so busy in our Holiday schedules, Christmas parties and shopping for the perfects gifts that we have no time left to consider the truth of Christmas which is why I'm glad that you are here today
Let's face the reality of the whole matter- the Day after Thanksgiving, Black Friday is the busiest shopping day and the day after Christmas is the busiest return day. So all the busyness to find the perfect gift doesn't always work.
One time when Jesus was teaching his disciples a parable about the word of God he referred to the word as being a seed that is sown and sometimes it fell on rocky ground and didn't take root and then he said sometimes the seed is sown among thorns and the thorns and weeds choke out the seed and is doesn't grow and then he explained the parable and said
Mar 4:19 but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.
See the angels were not mistaken when the proclaimed Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth. But instead society has placed such an emphasis on the stuff we buy and the parties we attend that the truth of Christmas has been choked out and peace has been replaced with chaos
It is possible for us to rediscover that peace and joy of the first Christmas when we rediscover the truth of Christmas and what it's really all about
Jesus said, Jhn 8:32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
Free from what? Free from the power of sin! Free from the guilt and shame of our sin! Free from cares and concerns of this world!
But we must know the truth and allow that truth to have a place to grown within our heart
So far in our study of Christmas we have looked at Christmas as told by the prophets, the untold story of Christmas from the book of Revelation and last week we looked at the forgotten man of Christmas, Joseph.
Today I want to share with you three simple truths of Christmas and how we can make application of these truths to have joy and peace in our chaotic world today.
Truth #1
God Became Man
In the Christmas song written by Charles Wesley, “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” He so clearly proclaims this simple truth when he wrote, “veiled in flesh the Godhead see, hail the incarnate deity, pleased as man with men to dwell Jesus our Emmanuel.” The word Incarnate is Latin and means to make into flesh
The Angel told Mary, “they shall call his name Immanuel (which means God with us). Matthew 1:23
Jesus was 100% man while at the same time 100% God.
This is what John was saying when he said, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” John 1:1
John 1:14, “and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
Jesus was not a creation of God like the Jehovah's witnesses teach He was the almighty, eternal God in Flesh. He did not set his deity aside to take upon himself flesh and become man he was still 100% God
In the very beginning of time when the stars were first hung in space, when the earth was created our Lord was there. Paul said, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities- all things were created through him and for him.” Colossians 1:15-16
At his birth Christ stepped out of the glories of heaven and humbled himself to become a man leaving for time the glories of heaven to be tempted and suffer everything that humanity suffers through today and to be faced with every temptation that you and I face today
turn in your Bibles to Philippians 2:6-9
Application of this truth
How do we get our hands around this truth in order to apply it today. In other words how can knowing that at Christmas God became man give us the peace and joy that the angels proclaimed to the shepherds?
In this same passage back up to verse 5, “Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus.”
verse 5 explains the rest of the passage Paul was telling the church that they need to be thinking like Christ did. The book of Philippians is written to the church in Philipi the purpose of the book is to teach the believers how to have joy and thanksgiving in their lives
and here is the key- “Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus.”
“Though he was God in flesh” he made himself nothing and took the form of a servant.”
Mar 10:45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."
In essence Paul is telling the church if you want to have joy you must have the mind of Christ who set his mind on serving others rather than wanting to be served. Isn't that what Jesus taught when he said it is more blessed to give than to receive
we must learn the simple truth that “It's not about me.” We live in a consumer society where we expect to be served which is why its so difficult for us to grasp this truth.
Yet when Jesus came into the upper room with his disciples and there was no one there to wash their feet, it was our Lord who put the towel around himself and began to wash the dirty feet.
I must confess this week our family went out to dinner and the hostess seated us............and we sat there while everyone else was being served.
I felt terrible about it even more so when we bowed our heads to ask a blessing on the food so I made a point to leave our waitress a larger than normal tip and to tell the hostess that I was sorry for the way I sounded and that our service was great
wouldn't the world be a better place if we all had the mind set of serving one another
One of the most well known mega churches in America, the willow creek community church did a study of their own church in 2007 and the results were shocking.
Their pastor Bill Hybels said it was the greatest wake up call of his adult life. They had built this church by making it appealing to the lost. Good music and atmosphere along with relevant teaching and serving peoples needs. What they created was a church of consumers
Pastor Bill said, “we should have started telling people and teaching people to take responsibility for themselves and to feed themselves the word of God. What's happening as the people in our church grow older the more they are expecting from the church and the more they want the church to feed them.
As a result of this study Bill said we are going to put more of the responsibility on the people who attend services so they can grow even if the church doesn't meet all their needs.”
we will never experience joy walking around expecting everyone else to serve us. The mind of Christ is one of servant-hood and humility
The truth about Christmas is that God became man, and he came to not to be served, but to serve to show us the way of peace, joy and contentment in this life and the life to come.
Second Truth
God demonstrated his love for mankind
Probably one of the most well known verses in the bible is found in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.,”
God coming to earth was the most selfless act that has ever been performed in all of history
God has always been a God of love and He has always loved humanity, That's why he waited for Noah to build the ark instead of just destroying mankind for good, that's why he met with the children of Israel in the Tabernacle. That's why he created Adam and Eve even though he knew they would sin and
the coming of Christ was a demonstration of that love in fullness because he came to take care of mans greatest need. The need for life, eternal life., sin in the garden caused the curse of death to be passed on all men, and The need to know that life has meaning and purpose, the need to have our sins forgiven and our guilt lifted the need to be reunited with the one is whose image we are created. All of this is possible today because of Christ coming into the world.
We know these things are mans greatest need because even those who claim to not believe in God still struggle with them
When the Apostle John described God he summed Him up with one word which is the word love
1Jo 4:7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
1Jo 4:8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
This is why separates Christianity from all other religions in the world, our God is not out of touch from man,. The worship of God is not about mans efforts to reach up to God but when we worship we are coming to celebrate the love of God, that He came down to man seeking to save the lost
Application
The truth of Christmas is the demonstration of Gods love to mankind. Jesus said its a new commandment
Jhn 13:34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
We are to love others as God loves us
That is the basis for our love
He loved us not expecting anything in return. I mean think about it, God had nothing to gain by coming to the earth to save mankind, he did it all for us. It was love without an agenda
and that is how he calls us to love one another. One of the reasons that so many people do not have joy in and peace in their heart is because instead of just accepting people and loving them like Jesus would they are spending all their time and energy into changing everyone to be like they are and if you don't change they don't accept you.
The church should be the only place on earth where you can come as you are and experience the love of Christ among his people and be accepted for who you are, a person of value because you were made in the image of God.
In the 1960's Pastor Chuck Smith of the calvary chapel is costa mesa CA was faced with a problem from his church board. Several hippies started coming to his church and at the board meeting someone brought up that they were concerned about the rivets in their Jeans scratching the pews. Without missing a beat Chuck Smith said, then we must get rid of the pews.
The reason the demon possessed, the prostitutes, the tax collectors and the outcast of society flocked to Jesus was because of that non judgmental, non condemning love that he had for them
Lets practice that love within this body it will give you peace and it will help others to discover the peace that comes by knowing Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, and people will flock to this place when the news gets out that the love of God abounds here
Truth #3
The Power of sin has been destroyed
Back to the reason that Jesus humbled himself and became a man according to Philippians 2:8, “And being found in human form he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
1Cr 15:55 "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?"
1Cr 15:56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.
1Cr 15:57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
The reason the angels proclaimed “Glory to God in the Highest and on earth peace among men.” is because they knew the purpose that Jesus was born. He was born to die because his death was necessary to destroy the power of sin over mankind.
This is why in 1 Cor 15 Paul refers to Jesus as being the last Adam. The first Adam brought death to man because of his sin, the Last Adam brought life, the only way he could do that was by paying for all of our sins on the cross. Sin and the law that brought death had to be canceled out in order for us to have everlasting life.
Application-
The Application of this truth is so powerful. Since the power of sin over us has been destroyed we are no longer victims of circumstances and situations we are no longer just old sinners on the road to recovery. But we are new Creatures in Christ Jesus. We have been adopted into the family of God and now we are join heirs with Christ Jesus
Go back in your bulletin insert and look at this verse again
1Cr 15:57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Because of this our song this Christmas season should be Glory to God in the Highest and on earth peace among men.
Closing
Let me ask you a personal question this morning- Do you have peace today? Do you know that your sins are forgiven? Do you have eternal life?
Three simple truths about Christmas- God became man, God Loves us, The power of Sin is Destroyed.
Simple truths but profound enough to change your life if you will allow them to.
Don't allow the busyness of this time of year cause the word of God to be unfruitful in your life. Don't allow these truths to be put on the back burner or even worse- Forgotten about
