At the time of Jesus’ birth, there were some shepherds out in the field, watching their flock in the night. An angel appeared to them and told them: ‘Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David A SAVIOUR, who is Christ the Lord’ [Luke 2:11].
Do you believe that Jesus’ birth is ‘good news of great joy’?
When we hear about some offer, we often subconsciously ask three questions. ‘Is it good?’ ‘Is it true?’ And, if it is good and true, ‘What should I do?
AN ILLUSTRATION
Let me give an example. Last week, I saw an advertisement in a newspaper. It said, ‘Free cod liver oil capsules from Holland and Barrett.’ Underneath, there was a voucher.
Let me ask my three questions.
Is it good? Yes, it is. Cod liver oil is good for you.
Is it true? Could I simply go into a Holland and Barrett shop and walk out with a bottle of cod liver oil capsules? I didn’t know if it was true. But I thought it might be.
If it was good and true, what should I do? Logically, I should accept the offer.
So, I went to the Holland and Barrett shop in Tesco Extra and presented my voucher.
Who thinks that I walked out of the shop with a bottle of cod liver oil capsules?
Well, I did. I got a bottle of 30 cod liver oil tablets. Here it is.
WHAT ABOUT JESUS?
The angel told the shepherds that he had ‘good news of great joy’. A Saviour had been born!
Is it good? Is it true? And if it is good and true, what should we do?
IS IT GOOD?
Is it good? Specifically, is it good that Jesus came into our world as a saviour?
In 1987, an 18-month-old baby named Jessica fell into an abandoned well in a town called Midland, in Texas. Jessica had been playing in her aunt’s backyard when she fell into the well. When I say ‘well’, this wasn’t an old-fashioned well like you see in pictures. This was a pipe which was just eight inches wide. Jessica fell until she was stuck, 22 feet below ground. She was alone. She couldn’t climb. In fact, she couldn’t move at all. She couldn’t communicate except for her cries. She was at risk of dehydration, hypothermia and injury. She was completely incapable of saving herself.
If someone saved Jessica, would that be good? Of course it would be.
Emergency services got to work. They dug another shaft to connect to the one Jessica had fallen down. Eventually, after 58 hours, a paramedic crawled through the shaft, reached Jessica and rescued her. She had only minor injuries.
Is that a picture of us? The Bible tells us that this is exactly true of us. We’re stuck in a hole and are completely incapable of saving ourselves.
Let me tell you another story.
There’s a nonprofit organization in the United States called RIP Medical Debt. It buys and forgives medical bills for people who can’t pay their healthcare costs. One person who benefited from it was a woman called Amanda.
Like Jessica, Amanda was from Texas. She was a single mother. She had a medical debt after a complicated childbirth. She worked full-time but couldn’t keep up with the bills. She was constantly worried, expecting to get calls from debt collectors. But one day, Amanda got a letter telling her that her medical debt – over $3,000 – had been completely forgiven through RIP Medical Debt. Afterwards she said, ‘It was like a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. I could finally breathe again. I felt hope for the first time in a long time.’
These two stories illustrate the Christian message. The Christian message is that every person in the world has disobeyed and wronged God. If no one rescues us, we will die. But no ordinary person can save us. We need a very special saviour. The Bible tells us that only Jesus, who never committed a sin, could save us. Jesus, by dying on the cross, paid the debt we couldn’t pay.
Now, we can come to God and say sorry. When we do that, God will forgive our sins. With our sins forgiven, death no longer has a hold on us.
Jesus told a woman called Martha, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die’ [John 11:25-26].
The New Testament tells us more than forty times that those who put their trust in Jesus inherit eternal life.
Jessica and Amanda were both stuck. We are also stuck – but we are even more stuck than Jessica or Amanda. But, as the angel told the shepherds, ‘…unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour’.
IS THAT GOOD?
But this is not the end of what is good about the Christian message. Far from it!
The Christian message starts with the fact that we need to be saved but it doesn’t stop there.
Let’s suppose a fireman rescues a woman from a burning building. Once she’s safe, she shakes the fireman’s hand, says thank you, and probably never sees the fireman again.
The Christian faith isn’t like that at all. Like the fireman, Jesus saves us. But he saves us SO THAT WE CAN BE part of God’s family! Let’s have a Bible reference which makes that clear.
This is Galatians 4:4-5. Paul wrote:
‘But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, SO THAT WE MIGHT RECEIVE ADOPTION AS SONS.’
God sent his son, Jesus, ‘to redeem those who were under the law.’ Great! Jesus paid the price to obtain our freedom. But Paul’s continues, SO THAT… So that, what? So that we might receive adoption as sons! The verse says ‘sons’ but I’m sure it means daughters as well. Wow! That’s amazing!
When we come to God and say sorry and mean it, God forgives our sins. And now, God is no longer angry with us. Now, we can have a relationship with God! In fact, God invites us to be members of his family. What would that be worth to us?
In 2005, Angelina Jolie adopted a seven-month-old Ethiopian girl named Zahara. Angelina Jolie is one of Hollywood’s best-known actresses.
Would being adopted by Angelina Jolie be good for Zahara? I think so!
IF IT WAS GOOD FOR ZAHARA TO BE ADOPTED BY A FAMOUS ACTRESS, WOULD IT BE GOOD FOR US TO BE ADOPTED INTO GOD’S FAMILY?
But the good things don’t stop there. Far from it! Think of Jesus and his 12 disciples. Jesus called them from what they were doing, and they then accompanied him wherever he went.
They had an amazing life! After Jesus had died and risen, one of Jesus’ disciples, Peter, was invited to the home of a Roman centurion called Cornelius. Peter told Cornelius about Jesus. He told him, ‘You know what happened throughout all Judea … how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit … HE WENT ABOUT DOING GOOD’ [Acts 10:37-38].
I love this statement that Jesus went around DOING GOOD. But Jesus didn’t do good on his own. He had his disciples with him. He was teaching them to do good.
Jesus hasn’t changed. He is still doing good – and he wants you and me to be part of it. You can spend your life in a meaningless, self-centred way. Or you can follow Jesus, have amazing adventures, and do good. Your life can impact people for good. You can live a life which means something.
IS THAT GOOD?
So, now we have three good things!
Jesus has taken the punishment for our sin. Our debt can be forgiven. We can move from death to life.
We can become members of God’s family.
And following Jesus, our life can have purpose and meaning.
Those are three things that are good. But I could tell you many more good things about following Jesus.
At the beginning of this talk I suggested that when we hear about some offer, we may subconsciously ask three questions. ‘Is it good?’ ‘Is it true?’ And, if it’s good and true, ‘What should I do?
IS IT TRUE?
We’ve looked at the first question. ‘Is it good?’ I hope you’ve got an answer to that.
But is it true?
The heart of this question is, ‘Who is Jesus?’ If Jesus is the Son of God, then the Christian message is true. And if Jesus is not the Son of God, then the Christian message is not true.
Bibliographies often contain the phrase, ‘born, lived, died.’ But the ‘born, lived, died’ formula doesn’t fit Jesus. Jesus was born, lived, died, AND ROSE AGAIN. Every part of Jesus’ life testifies to who he is.
Let’s work backwards.
We’ll start with Jesus rising again. The Bible tells us that God raised Jesus to life after three days in the tomb. If it’s true, it’s the strongest possible evidence that Jesus is the Son of God. But is it true? Sceptics wanting to disprove the Christian faith have examined the evidence for the resurrection. They assumed they would be able to prove that Jesus’ resurrection was NOT true. But when they looked at the evidence, they were forced to change their minds. But for me, the simplest argument that God really raised Jesus from the dead is this. Why would eleven men risk their lives to proclaim that Jesus was risen if they weren’t absolutely convinced it was true?
Let’s now turn to Jesus’ death. Jesus’ death is a fact. This isn’t only based on what the Bible tells us. There are five writers from the first and second centuries, outside the Bible, who refer to Jesus’ death. Tacitus and Josephus are the best known. But we don’t just want to know if Jesus died. We want to know if the circumstances of his death point to him being God. They definitely do! When Jesus died, he fulfilled many prophecies. Zechariah prophesied that the Messiah would be pierced. Jesus was pierced with a spear. Isaiah prophesied that the Messiah would be with the rich in his death. Jesus was placed in a rich man’s tomb. David prophesied that people would cast lots for the Messiah’s clothing. Roman soldiers did that. There are many other prophecies like that. The fact that there were these prophecies and that Jesus fulfilled them is strong evidence that he was the Son of God.
What about Jesus’ life? Jesus’ miracles especially point to who he was. Who could calm a storm except the Son of God? Who could feed 5000 people except the Son of God? Jesus said, ‘For the works that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear witness about me that the Father has sent me’ [John 5:36].
Finally, we come to Jesus’ birth. A baby is born. What is to say that this baby was the Son of God? A lot, actually! There were angels appearing all over the place. There were prophecies fulfilled. Shepherds dropped in, and then magi from the east. Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the temple, and Simeon and Anna burst out in praise and prophecy.
I can’t cover all the evidence that the Christian faith is true in five minutes. But I hope I’ve given you a taste.
So, where does this bring us?
I suggested that when we hear about some offer, we may ask three questions. Is it good? Is it true? And if it is good and true, what should I do?
What about Jesus and his offer to us?
Is it good? Jesus offers to move us from death to eternal life. He offers adoption into God’s family. He offers a life of purpose and meaning. And much more.
Is it true? Every part of Jesus’ life: his birth, his life, his death and his resurrection, is packed with evidence that he is the Son of God. If Jesus is the Son of God, everything he said is true.
So, if it is good, and if it is true, what should we do?
After Jesus died, his disciples formed a church. Peter was their leader. One day, Peter preached to a very large crowd. He told them that God had raised Jesus and that Jesus was Lord and Christ. Then we read: ‘Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”’
‘What shall we do?’ It’s a great question. The crowd knew they had to do something! But what?
Peter told the crowd, ‘Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.’
Repenting means that you tell Jesus, ‘I’m sorry for the things I’ve done wrong. Please forgive me. I turn from the way I’ve lived in the past. I accept you as my Lord and king.’ It doesn’t have to be complicated.
And then, when you’re ready, you should be baptized. Baptism is full of symbolism, but it isn’t just symbolism. Baptism is a way of saying, solemnly, in front of other people, ‘I have decided to follow Jesus.’ Jesus wants you to do that.
On the day Jesus was born, an angel told some shepherds that he had good news of great joy. That day, a saviour had been born – Christ the Lord.
Is it good? Is it true? What do you believe? And if it is good and true, what are you going to do?
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TALK GIVEN AT ROSEBERY PARK BAPTIST CHURCH, BOURNEMOUTH, UK, 7TH DECEMBER 2025, 10.30 A.M. SERVICE
