Title: Let Us Rejoice, For He Has Come 12/23/01
West Side
Text: Luke 2:8-14 A.M. Service
Purpose: Christmas Sunday sermon dealing with the idea of worship.
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Introduction: Christmas
Robert Fulghum in It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It, tells a story involving his daughter, Molly. One day, as Fulghum was ready to leave for work, Molly handed him two brown paper sacks. In one was his lunch. What was in the other was a mystery. When Fulghum asked Molly what was in the mystery bag, she said, "Just some stuff—take it with you." At lunch time, Fulghum tore open the mystery bag, Dumping the contents onto his desk. The contents
consisted of: two hair ribbons, three small stones, a plastic dinosaur, a pencil stub, a tiny seashell, two animal crackers, a marble, a used
lipstick, a small doll, two chocolate kisses, and thirteen pennies.
Later in the day, when Fulghum was cleaning off his desk before going home, he wiped the contents of Molly’s bag into the waste basket. As he said, "There wasn’t anything in there I needed." That evening Molly asked where her bag was. He told her he had left it at his office, and asked, "why?" Molly said, "Those are my things in the sack, Daddy, the ones I really like—I thought you might like to play with them, but now I want them back.
You didn’t lose the bag did you, Daddy?"
"Those are my things in the sack, Daddy, the ones I really like." To Fulghum the hair ribbons, small stones, pencil stub, a used lipstick and all the rest did not seem like much. To Molly, they were her most priceless treasures. The things she loved the most. But Fulghum did not have the sight to see their true value.
Long ago some shepherds left their fields and made their way to a stable. When they looked into the manger they saw a very ordinary baby wrapped in swaddling cloths. Whether the baby was sleeping, crying, or cooing, we are not told. But the shepherds saw something more, something which others who were gathered with Mary and Joseph apparently did not see. In this baby in the manger the shepherds saw none other than the One in whom all God’s people find joy and peace, just as the angels had told them. The shepherds had heard the promise, had believed the promise, and in believing saw more than met the ordinary eye. In Jesus they saw the One in whom we have joy and peace.
This morning, I’d like for us to focus on this concept: “Let us rejoice, for He has come.”
Read Text: Luke 2:8-14
I. We Need Not Be Afraid, For He Has Come
There is a line in the movie, “Field of Dreams” when the man contemplating about what to do. Build this new baseball field in the middle of corn country, or sell the corn field to pay off debts. During that moment, James Earl Jones stands and gives this impassioned speech about why it is necessary to build this field, basically saying, if you build it, they will come.
In some ways, that thinking has gotten us in trouble. Meaning we’ve taken that premise and expanded it. If I have the right job, or the right income, or the right spouse, or if I could just make it so that life would all work together, then I would not need to be afraid.
Recent events, including September 11, have shattered thinking, as we watched the twin towers crumble. Symbols of America’s strength crumbled to earth.
In a post modern kind of world, where absolutes have been challenged, and uncertainty on just about every level of life, national, foreign, locally with layoffs, and even violence in the very home land of our Lord, we need not be afraid, for He has come.
That night, an angel appeared to some shepherds who were watching their flocks. Listen to what the Angel said.
A. Do not be afraid: Why? Well, in verse 9 it says that they were out watching their flocks, when suddenly, the angel appeared.
B. That can be a little unsettling, especially during that day and age.
The other day, while returning from making a hospital call, I approached two vehicles. One was moving into a turning lane, but hadn’t moved all the way over, and the other began to stop just past there to make a left hand turn. It was early, and I was watching the car moving into the lane, and didn’t see the other vehicle stopped. I quickly reacted stepping on my breaks. It startled me, even though I wasn’t even close to the other vehicle. But for the next few moments, my heart raced as I made my way to the office.
C. I bring good news of great joy for all people. We’ll get to this in just a moment. But the Angel also said, today. The time has come. God was keeping his promise.
Galatians 4:4-5 says, “But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, 5 to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons.”
Or as another translation says, “In the fullness of time…” This didn’t just happen by coincidence. This wasn’t just the luck of the draw, and congratulations, you’re the lucky winner to receive a savior today. Please come to Bethlehem to collect your prize.
No, not at all. This was the very time in history, [and that’s another whole sermon], that God wanted to send his Son. From the time Adam and Eve sinned in the garden to this day, this was the appointed time.
So we need not fear, because in God’s timing, He sent his Son.
D. The scripture also says that Jesus was born.
Here he was:
The eternal one, caught in a moment of time.
The Omnipresence corralled in a cave manger.
The Omnipotent cradled in a helpless infant who could not even raise His head from the straw.
The Omniscience confined in a baby who would not say a word.
The Christ who created the heavens and the earth cradled in a manger in a cave stable.
For when God would draw near to a cold, cruel, sinful, suffering humanity, he placed a baby in a manger in Bethlehem.
II. Because He Came, We Can Have Joy. Why?
A. Verse 10: I bring you “good news.”
Now don’t we all like to get good news.
1. You got that promotion
2. You’re going to have a baby
3. The loan was approved.
Where do you go, to look for your good news?
1. Morning newspaper.
2. Cup of coffee
3. A good friend
4. God’s Word.
Illustration:
We Can’t See What Is Before us, We are Never Content
In a Peanuts comic strip Lucy is speaking with Linus at the base of a hill. She says, "Someday I’m going over that hill and find the answer to my dreams.... Someday I’m going over that hill and find hope and fulfillment. I think, for me, all the answers to life lie beyond these clouds and over the grassy slopes of that hill!"
Linus removes his thumb from his mouth, points toward the hill, and
responds: "Perhaps there’s another little kid on the other side of that hill who is looking this way and thinking that all the answers to life lie on this side of the hill." Lucy looks at Linus, then turns toward the hill and yells, "Forget it, kid!"
The Shepherd, probably along with many, had heard the O.T. Scriptures read, and were waiting and watching.
Question: Are you content? Are you searching in life? Does it seem like life’s answers are just out of reach, or just over the next hill, or job promotion.
Let me share with you today, that you can find contentment and joy in Jesus Christ. Because he has come, he has brought good news.
B. What is that good news?
1. “a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” V. 11.
a. This was the savior of the word.
b. Little, unassuming town of Bethlehem, born to what seemed like to many, where unqualified parents.
c. And yet God chosen them
“When his parents wrap Jesus in cloths to keep his limbs straight and lay him in the manger, the humble emptying of the Christ has begun.
“Importance is not a matter of one’s environment or the supposed status that things bring. Rather, importance is a function of one’s role in God’s work. Jesus is important not because of the setting of his birth, but because of who he is before God. For one moment, the center of God’s activity resides in an animal trough. The dignity of this event comes from the person lying at the center. Sometimes God’s work goes on quietly in hidden locales.
2. Notice how God uses the sense of community and others involvement into this significant event.
While this was a very private moment for Mary and Joseph, God involved a sense of community in allowing the Shepherds to partake of one of the greatest events in history. “God is involved not just with the special or the great, but with all people.”
Those “on whom God’s favor rests” includes those whose claim to fame may be nothing more than that they wake up each day and pursue a living in the service to God.”
Illustration: The Meaning of Christmas
A television interviewer was walking the streets of Tokyo at Christmas time. Much as in America, Christmas shopping is a big commercial success in Japan. The interviewer stopped one young women on the sidewalk, and asked, "What is the meaning of Christmas?"
Laughing, she responded, "I don’t know. Is that the day that Jesus died?" There was some truth in her answer.
Jesus came so that we might some day find the forgiveness of our sins through Jesus Christ. That’s the other half of the equation.
III. In finding Forgiveness, we express our worship and praise.
“The need to praise God is universal, no matter what era we belong to. The notes of praise underline the importance of verbal praise to God. These heavenly notes lift up the soul and open us up to be receptive to God. Praise given to God benefits those who offer that praise by refreshing their souls.”
“In a real sense, the story of Jesus is our story, told to us and for us just as if we had been among the angels on that night near Bethlehem. What the angels announced to the shepherds that night is announced on behalf of all humanity.
When people see that everything happened according to what God had told the shepherds, they and we should sense that God does what he says.
Perhaps after almost 2000 years of publicity about Jesus, the church takes the amazing involvement of God with us for granted. The world certainly rarely takes the time to really look and see what Jesus is all about. Usually it never gets past the story about the baby Jesus. Is that the church’s fault for failing to engage the world?
Is it the world’s too busy to stop and notice or too distracted by other appeals? Is it both? If the world odes stop and look, it often sees Jesus as one teacher among many. But the tearing of the heavenly host rules out such a limiting view of Jesus. He is the Savior, who is Christ the Lord. He is no longer in a crib and no longer confined to a manger. He is now seated at the right hand of God, aware of what we do and say.
Who the baby Jesus was is nothing compared to who he is.
The response of the shepherds and Mary involves both praise and obedience. When God guides us through trial, a vocational crossroads, or a decision involving a mate, our future, or our children, we should be prepared to speak about how he has impacted our lives.
All the figures in this story received a new revelation of who God is and what he is about. But we should never take God for granted, nor should praise become formal and routine.
What an honor it is to know God and see him active in our lives. To regain the flame, we must turn to him and honestly admit here we are and ask him to open our cloudy eyes.
Sometimes just the reflection that comes from the Christmas season or reflecting on Jesus’ story can renew our sense of relationship to God. The King, the son of David, the Lord, the Savior, was sent from heaven to identify with us, walk with us, die for us, be raised for us, and to relate to us – that is the story of Jesus, a story worthy of praise and worthy to be told.
Footnotes
1. Donald L. Deffner, Seasonal Illustrations, Resouces, 1992, p. 16-17
2. The Wesleyan Bible Commentary, 1986. p. 221
3. Brett Blair, www.eSErmons.com, December 2001
4. The NIV Application Commentary, Darrell L. Bock. 1996. pg 86.
5. IBID, pg 87
6. IBID, pg 87
7. Deffner, Seasonal Illustrations
8. The NIV Application Commentary, p. 86
