INTRODUCTION: A little boy drew a manger scene in his Sunday School class. When he was done he showed the teacher what he had drawn. There was Mary and Joseph, and baby Jesus, and the animals, and the shepherds, and a chubby boy sitting by the baby Jesus. The teacher asked, "who is this chubby boy in your manger scene?", He replied, "thats round John Virgin". Just as the little boy had a distorted perception of that Christmas Hymn, many have a distorted view of Christmas. We live in what has been called by many theologians "the post Christian era". The influence of Christianity is rapidly being dilluted in our culture. Institutions and Holidays that were once sacred have now lost most if not all of their religious significance. The average person on the street in our major cities does not know the true origins of Christmas. The truth of the matter is, even those of us that do know the true meaning of Christmas tend to forget it amidst all of the shopping, and gift giving, and family,and meals. So this morning I want to remind us of what Christmas is really all about.
Galatians chapter 4:4-7 is a Christmas text. The Galatians also needed a reminder about the significance and meaning of Christmas. They were turning from the Gospel of the grace of God to the bondage of the law. Paul wrote these words to remind them of the significance of what Christ had done for them when he came to the earth.
(READ Gal. 4:4-7)
What is Christmas really all about?
I. ITS ABOUT THE ADVENT OF A SAVIOUR (4)
Christmas is a celebration of the most important day in human history, The day that Christ came to earth. In this verse we see some very important things about Christ and his coming to earth.
a) First we see his Divine Origin---there was an event that took place before the birth of Christ in the manger, even before the conception of Christ in the womb of the virgin. It was the sending forth of Christ from God the Father. The bible says, "But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son". You see Jesus had always existed with the Father. John says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God." As a man Jesus prayed to the Father, "glorify me with thine own self with the glory I had with thee before the World was." Jesus had always existed in perfect loving fellowship with God the Father. One day, God sent him forth.
The bible doesn’t describe this event except to demonstrate to us that Jesus made a conscious choice to be sent. In Philippians 2 it says, "he did not consider equality with God something to be grapsed, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness." In love for humanity the Father sent the Son, in love for the Father and humanity Jesus willingly went.
When I was a young Father, my oldest boy was about a year old, Linda and I had been trying to make it. I was going to school full time making minimum wage. Something had to be done or we wouldn’t make it. I had to join the military. I’ll never forget the day that I was sent off, for the first time leaving my Son and my wife. I remember sitting on the curb outside of the Days Inn Motel in San Antonio before dawn broke waiting for a bus to take me to the processing station. I remember the lonely feeling, the homesick feeling, and I hadn’t even left yet, kissing my wife and my child good bye.
We can only imagine what took place when Jesus was sent forth. He willingly and obediently and lovingly left a place of glory and sinlessness, and ceaseless worship, and perfection, and unbroken fellowship with the Father and entered into the womb of a teenage girl. He became a frail human, an embryo a fetus, and unborn babe. From the bossom of the Father to the womb of a teenage girl. I don’t believe it is possible for us to grasp this. Words fail here tremendously. All the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in a human embryo. Oh how Jesus limited himself to time and space. Oh how he condescended in love. This is his divine origin. Next we see
b)His full humanity---"made of a woman"--The previous statement "God sent forth His Son" could be said of no other man in the history of the world. The next statement, "made of a woman" is true of all men. While Jesus was fully divine in origin, he was likewise fully human. He entered the world just as you and I entered the world. He was born of a woman. He was a man. He was Mary’s son. He hungered, and thirsted, and ate, and drank, and worked, and played, and laughed, and wept, and hurt, and bled, and studied, and sang, and prayed, and lived, and died as a man.
Jesus’ most frequent title for himself was "Son of Man". Although he knew its messianic implications, I believe he also used it to stress his full humanity. After all, it was the seed of the woman, a man that would crush the head of the serpent, the devil. He became a man. Then we see from this verse:
c) His ethnicity--"made under the law". He was born a Jew. Like all Jews he placed himself under the Law of Moses. Although he was God’s son he subjected himself to God’s law. In fact, when he began to teach he made clear that he had not (contrary to popular belief) come to abolish the law but to fulfill it. And that he did perfectly. He fulfilled it, not only outwardly, but perfectly obeying God’s law from the heart. This could be said of no other man who has ever lived.
Christmas is about the advent of a Saviour. He lowered himself, he condescended, He went down, down, down to bring us up, up, up. In Eph. 4:8 Paul describes what we have just studied. "Wherefore he saith, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. Now that he ascended what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things." Christmas is about the advent of a Saviour, and because of that advent its also about---
II. THE ACCEPTANCE OF SINNERS (5)
Verse 5 begins with the word "to". To do what? Paul is now going to tell us why Christmas came, why he was born, why he lived under the law. He tells us there is a two fold purpose, one building upon the other.
a)To redeem them that were under the law---To redeem means to set free, to purchase ones freedom. Who are "them that were under the law". Well, first this speaks of the Jewish people. "Unto them were committed the oracles of God". Christ came to set his own people free from the enslavement of the law. The law was given directly to them. However, all men are subject to and accountable to the law of God. Paul said of the gentiles, "For the gentiles which have not the law do by nature the things contained in the law, these having not the law are a law unto themselves, which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another." (Romans 2:14-15) All men are subject to God’s law Jew and Gentile alike.
Why must we be set free from God’s moral law? Because God’s moral law alone cannot make us righteous. Knowing the rules, and trying to keep the rules in our own power has always resulted in failure. We need something more than a written moral code. We need a change of heart.
We must also be set free from the law because the law carries with it a curse. Moses said in Duet. 27:26 "Cursed be he that confirmeth not ALL the words of this law to do them". ALL. We must completely fulfill the law of God perfectly or we are cursed by it. The curse is spiritual, phyisical, and eternal death. It only takes the breaking of one of God’s laws to bring a curse upon us. To do one thing immoral in thought, word, or deed, omission, or commission. Adam and Eve broke one law, one command, and they brought death not only to themselves but to all mankind. Imagine a man suspended from a cliff by a chain of 100 links. How many links of the chain must break to kill him. Just one out of one hundred. And so it is with the law of God. All men live under the curse of it.
Jesus came to set us free from the law and its curse of death and hell. How did he do it. Chapter three of this same book tells us, verse 13 "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree."
He freed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. Moses said in his law, "cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree." He descended as low as becoming a curse. "Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted." He removed our curse by taking our curse as he suffered, and bled, and died on the cross.
"Free from the law oh happy condition. Jesus hath bled and there is remission. Brused by the fall, and cursed by the law, but grace hath redeemed us once and for all." God’s curse has been once and for all removed, for all those that believe. Why did he remove our curse?
b) That we might recieve the adoption of sons---He set us free from the curse so that he could place us in his family, so that you and I could become adopted sons of God, bearing all rights and priviliges as natural sons and daughters. "Oh what manner of Love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God." From slavery to sonship.
The bible says that we are by our very nature’s "the children of wrath". Our sin is an offense to God. It is ugly. It is repulsive. One verse says, that God "cannot look upon sin".
I found an article that a woman named Mary Ann Byrd wrote. She said,
"I grew up knowing I was different, and I hated it. I was born with a cleft palate, and when I started school, my classmates made it clear to me how I looked to others, a little girl with a misshapen lip, crooked nose, lopsided teeth, and garbled speech.
When schoolmates aksed, "What happened to your lip?" I’d tell them I’d fallen and cut it on a piece of glass. Somehow it seemed more acceptable to have suffered an accident than to have been born different. I was convinced that no one outside my family could love me.
There was, however a teacher in the second grade whom we all adored,-Mrs. Leonard by name. She was short, round, happy-a sparkling lady.
Annually we had a hearing test...Mrs. Leonard gave the test to everyone in the class, and finally it was my turn. I knew from past years that as we stood against the door and covered one ear, the teacher sitting at her desk would whisper something, and we would have to repeat it back-things like "the sky is blue" or Do you have new shoes?" I waited there fore those words that God must have put into her mouth, those seven words that changed my life. Mrs. Leonard said in her whisper, "I wish you wer my little girl." God says to every person deformed by sin I wish you were my son or my daughter.
He made possible through his death for us to be accepted as his adopted sons. Christmas is about the Acceptance of Sinners. Lastly its about
III. THE ASSURANCE OF THE SPIRIT (7)
God sent forth Jesus to redeem us. God inhabited human flesh. All of that took place outside of us. Our redemption, our adoption,these are things we can know about and believe, but they all take place outside of us.
But God makes it real to us. He sends forth again. Once again the divine takes up residence in the human.
"he sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your heart". God lives in our innermost being. A personal Christmas. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ making us alive, making us know that we are children of God for the Holy Spirit within us cries out "Abba Father".
The first words formed on the lips of a hebrew child, "Abba" or "daddy". A natural or shall I say a supernatural unreasoned affection and trust. Father means nurturer, protector, and provider. This is a reasoned expresson of confidence in God as Father.
This is the heartcry of the child of God. A cry of trust, a cry of closeness, a cry of kinship, a cry of worship and love. Is that your hearts cry this morning.
In our heart of hearts God is not distant, He’s not cruel, we are not terrified of Him. In our heart of hearts he’s Abba, Daddy. Has this been your experience? It can be. By the miracle of the new birth. It comes about when you turn from your old way of life and embrace Jesus by faith, Believing with all of your heart that he died for your sins to redeem you, that he rose from the dead, and invite him to send his Spirit into your heart. It will be the best Christmas you ever had. Listen to words of Oh Little Town of Bethlehem.
"Oh Holy Child of Bethlehem Descend in us we pray. Cast out our sin and enter in. Be born in us today. We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad tidings tell. Oh come to us, abide with us our Lord Immanuel."
