Dakota Community Church
December 18, 2011
Love
It is hard to believe that we are already at week four in this season of Advent! Between our trip to the Dominican Republic and last week’s Children’s Church concert the month is flying by.
So far we have looked at the hope (past, present, and future) that Christmas offers to every man; then in week two, Tyson shared something about striped shirts looking like landscapes on him (from what I can gather he is at peace with this disturbing reality thanks to Christmas?) and last week along with “The Mouse’s Tale” we celebrated the joy of the season that comes only from God. The three candles stand glowing and just now the fourth – the candle of love – has been lit.
What do we say about love at Christmas?
Gary Chapman’s “The Five Love Languages” comes to mind. During the Christmas season all five are being spoken to and by almost everyone.
Quality Time – how much extra visiting goes on at this time of year?
Encouraging Words – even complete strangers offering seasonal well wishes.
Touch – an abundance of hugging and back patting, even wet cheek kisses from aunties.
Acts of Service – meals cooked, dishes washed, homes decorated for guests…
Gifts – Let’s not forget the gift giving!
For those who look forward all year to this wonderful time – these expressions of love are surely a huge part of that anticipation.
And yet; as we sit here in Church this morning, I can’t help but notice that all of this love talk to this point has been something well known to me all of my life – even without knowledge of salvation. All my life I was reminded that Jesus is the “reason for the season”; for the first 18 of those Christmases – I did not know Him.
We need to go deeper in our reflections.
Beyond happy memories, beyond seasonal blessings, beyond ourselves; Christmas like everything else in this Biblical narrative, is not about us!
This morning I want us to think about three expressions of love that we see in the Christmas season that are amazing and true for every person born on this planet – even those who have come to hate this season for one reason or another.
1. God’s great love for every man.
First and foremost Christmas is the ultimate expression of God’s great love for man.
John 3:1-21
1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. 2 He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him.”
3 In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.”
4 “How can a man be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!”
5 Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
9 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.
10 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 11 I tell you the truth, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? 13 No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.
16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21 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.”
Notice that God’s motivation for Christmas is love for the whole world.
Notice that Jesus did not come to condemn BECAUSE those who do not believe already stand condemned!
Notice that Jesus sets himself apart from all other men on the issue of authority – He alone knows the situation from heaven’s point of view.
Notice that you cannot enter the Kingdom of God unless you are born of water and the Spirit and that this is different than being born of the flesh.
Mark 10:45
45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
To miss this rescuing act of love and its necessity is to miss the point of the Christian faith and yet the very idea of condemned humanity and a suffering savior redeemer is offensive to most of the people on our fallen planet.
The Muslims in particular are incensed by the notion of God having a Son and that God would submit to suffering and death to redeem mankind.
’Christmas is evil’: Muslim group launches poster campaign against festive period
By Daily Mail Reporter
Fanatics from a banned Islamic hate group have launched a nationwide poster campaign denouncing Christmas as evil.
Organizers plan to put up thousands of placards around the UK claiming the season of goodwill is responsible for rape, teenage pregnancies, abortion, promiscuity, crime and pedophilia.
They hope the campaign will help ’destroy Christmas’ in this country and lead to Britons converting to Islam instead.
Labour MP and anti racist campaigner Jim Fitzpatrick branded the posters ’extremely offensive’ and demanded they were immediately ripped down.
The placards, which have already appeared in parts of London, feature an apparently festive scene with an image of the Star of Bethlehem over a Christmas tree.
But under a banner announcing ‘The evils of Christmas’ it features a message mocking the song the 12 Days of Christmas
It reads: ’On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me an STD.
’On the second day debt, on the third rape, the fourth teenage pregnancies and then there was abortion.’
According to the posters, Christmas is also too responsible for paganism, domestic violence, homelessness, vandalism, alcohol and drugs.
Another offence of Christmas, it proclaims, is ’claiming God has a son’.
The bottom of the poster declares: ’In Islam we are protected from all of these evils. We have marriage, family, honour, dignity, security, rights for man, woman and child.’
The campaign’s organizer is 27-year-old Abu Rumaysah, who once called for Sharia Law in Britain at a press conference held by hate preacher leader Anjem Choudary, the leader of militant group Islam4UK.
Former Home Secretary Alan Johnson banned Islam4UK group earlier this year, making it a criminal offence to be a member, after it threatened to protest at Wootton Bassett, the town where Britain honors its war dead.
Mr Rumaysah told the Mail that he was unconcerned about offending Christians.
He said: ’Christmas is a lie and as Muslims it is our duty to attack it.
’But our main attack is on the fruits of Christmas, things like alcohol abuse and promiscuity that increase during Christmas and all the other evils these lead to such as abortion, domestic violence and crime.
’We hope that out campaign will make people realize that Islam is the only way to avoid this and convert.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1340794/Christmas-evil-Muslim-group-launch-poster-campaign-festive-period.html#ixzz1gKGre1LB
Of course this sentiment is far from reserved for adherents of Islam and other false religions – many are adamant today that they need no saving.
“I was born right the first time” is a commonly held view these days nevertheless this refusal to recognize or acknowledge our desperate condition serves to illustrate the second expression of love we see emphasized during the Christmas season:
2. Man’s great love of sin and self.
A chief reason we have all heard given for disliking this holiday season by those who do is the commercialism, the greed, the utter disregard for anyone but self – in a nutshell the unabashed selfishness expressed in so many sins of choice during a time that is supposed to be about Jesus, His coming, His giving and our rejoicing in Him.
Matthew 2:16
When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.
It is no coincidence that the Christmas message of love includes one of the most brutal acts of hatred recorded in the Bible.
Herod is not interested in a savior to whom He would have to submit and there are always plenty of men willing to carry out the horrific demands of wicked leadership – sin and selfishness in the extreme.
We are celebrating God’s great rescue mission of love this morning and yet even those of us who have called on the name of the Lord and are saved must look at ourselves and acknowledge that unless we are given the gift of Christ’s righteousness we are doomed to hell if we must earn our own. Look at the first three of the Ten Commandments honestly:
Exodus 20:1-7
1 And God spoke all these words:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
Have I wholeheartedly and honestly given God first place in my life?
Have I loved Him with all of my heart?
Have I loved anything more than I love Him – myself perhaps, or some other person, or some pleasure or thing or this world itself?
Have I truly worshipped God in Spirit and wholeheartedly?
Is there anything in heaven, on earth, or under the sea – anything anywhere – that I bow down to, that I submit to, that I give myself to; besides the LORD?
Is my worship reserved for Him alone who sits on the throne?
Do I honor the Name of the Lord?
Do I treat as Holy the only Name given under heaven by which men must be saved?
Do I use that Name to claim silly and selfish desires?
Are my prayers vain ramblings or dead repetitions with His Holy Name attached?
So we see this great redeeming LOVE of God in the Christmas season; and – if we are honest – we see our own great LOVE of sin and self on display right there beside it.
So what is the answer?
Do more, try harder?
Romans 7:21-25
So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
3. Love’s power to melt the hardest of hearts.
Romans 2:4
Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance?
We are the proof!
The gospel penetrated the rocky soil of your heart and mine and here we are in church to worship and rejoice in His LOVE.
PowerPoint available (Free of charge) on request dcormie@mts.net
Follow Dan Cormie on twitter: @DanCormie
