INTRO: I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas. I trust you are enjoying the holiday season.
-How many opened presents last night? How many are opening presents today? Then there’s no real hurry to get through this sermon today.
-When I think about Christmas, two of them stand out. One of them was when I was a little boy, when I got my first bike. It was bright green and I thought it was cool how the Christmas lights reflected off of it.
-The second was when Tammy and I were dating a couple of months. I got this bright idea to wrap up these old leather boots and surprise her. She wasn’t too surprised—it went over like a lead weight. I was trying to be funny and it wasn’t funny to her.
TS: How many times do we get disappointed over the Christmas season, whether it not spending time with the relatives or it’s spending time with the relatives? Or maybe we’re disappointed in the gifts we got or the gifts we couldn’t give. Christmas has been disappointing. I would say don’t miss the reason for the season.
Warning: We can make the same mistake the devout and religious folks made when they missed the importance of Jesus’ birth.
-Jesus’ birth had been prophesied for centuries prior to his coming. One reason they missed him was that he came wrapped in a way that they didn’t expect.
Point: Many were waiting for a Messiah that would come with all the trappings of power and glory. Instead, the Messiah came wrapped in swaddling clothes (strips of cloth). Instead of a grand palace, the Messiah came into the world through a stable and used a feeding trough for a bassinette. Instead of coming as a mighty warrior, the Messiah came as a baby, needing to be fed and changed.
TITLE: Are You Missing the Meaning?
TEXT: Luke 2:6-7
I. Setting. The emperor Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census be taken over the entire Roman world. A. Requirements. Everyone had to go back to his own hometown to register.
1. Joseph and his soon-to-be-wife were traveling back to their hometown of Bethlehem because he was of the line of David.
2. Mary was about to have a child. Can you imagine traveling when you’re pregnant and about ready to have a child.
-Lo and behold, you’re in labor pains and there is no room anywhere. So you have to go to the barn with the animals.
-Jesus is born in a smelly manger. Imagine the king of the universe born with the animals.
B. I believe this humble beginning was to relay a message to us
-That God understands what it means to be human, coming down in poor conditions rather than a rich palace.
1. It would be hard enough for God to become man.
-What a step down even in a rich setting.
Point: God knows what it means to be human. God knows what it means to be like us. II. What does it mean that God became like us?
A. First, we know that he understands what we go through every day of our lives because he made the trip before.
1. He came and shared in the very same drudgery that sometimes we have to endure. He has wept like we weep.
-He hungered like we hunger. He saw death take those he loved just like we experience. -He has seen how disease has ravaged people.
-He knew weariness of pain and suffering.
B. Secondly, he knows what injustice is about. He knew what it meant to feel betrayed by a friend.
1. Have you ever been accused of doing something that you didn’t do?
-He knows what that is like.
2. Have you ever had to pay the price for someone else’s failure? Jesus wore a crown of thorns and hung on a cross for our sins. Because he had to go through so much pain, he identifies fully with us.
C. What does it mean that God became like us? When God promises to wipe away our tears, it isn’t without understanding the hurts that cause them. Jesus lived them all.
1. When God promises to come to us to bring peace and joy, it isn’t a vacuum, he knows both our perspective.
2. When God promises to give us forgiveness, he does so knowing the high cost of that forgiveness because he paid the price for that forgiveness.
D. What does it mean that God became like us? He understood the frailties of mankind. 1. He understood the temptation we all face on a daily basis.
-Hebrews 4:15, "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are – yet without sin."
2. Jesus not only knew the temptation we face, but he knew the full weight of the temptation we could ever face.
Example. It would be like Adam lifting weights. He gets down to bench press 200 pounds, he lifts it up and goes down to his chest and pushes it up. He’s all excited he could lift it but in reality I was spotting him holding on to the bar and I was in truth lifting 190 pounds. Adam was only lifting 10 pounds.
-This is what happens when we’re tempted. We can only face a partial weight where Jesus faced the full weight.
3. So with this being said, the truth is Jesus knows more about the frailties of being human that we do.
-That’s why the writer of the book of Hebrews tells us he can sympathize with our weakness because he knows the full weight of it.
Point: So if you find yourself discouraged, depressed, and down thinking nobody really knows what I’m going through, that is not true. Jesus does, he’s been there.
-In fact he knows the full pain and he can help you through it.
4. The Bible also instructs us that Jesus is the author and perfector of life.
-Jesus created human life, lived as a human, overcame the curse of death showing us the way to eternal life with him.
E. It is difficult to understand all the implications of God becoming man.
1. It gives us an opportunity for hope, it means that we can have God come into our hearts and change who we are.
-Freeing us from the fear of death, death has no more sting. -Jesus came down, born in a manger, for all of us.
2. Jesus is not some cold distant God. He demonstrated his love for us as a babe in a manger and later by the cross of Calvary.
3. One day we will understand the implications of God becoming man, when we stand before him one day.
II. Christmas is about God coming down to the level of human in order to show us the way. A. When everything is tied around Christ, everything flows so much smoother. 1. Gifts, relatives, excitement of the season, the holiday cheer.
2. But when we lose focus and forget the purpose of celebrating Christmas
-We get under bondage about gifts, and uneasiness about the in-laws. We get caught up in the stress of the busy pace.
I-was the Day after Christmas
`Twas the day after Christmas, When all through the place
There were arguments and depression
Even Mom had a long face.
The stockings hung empty,
And the house was a mess; The new clothes didn’t fit...
And Dad was under stress.
The family was irritable,
And the children—no one could please; Because the instructions for the swing set Were written in Chinese!
The bells no longer jingled,
And no carolers came around; The sink was stacked with dishes, And the tree was turning brown.
The stores were full of people
Returning things that fizzled and failed,
And the shoppers were discouraged
Because everything they’d bought was now on half-price sale!
`Twas the day AFTER Christmas
The spirit of joy had disappeared;
The only hope on the horizon
Was twelve bowl games the first day of the New Year!
Point: Let’s not lose focus on what the Lord has done and what he’s going to do.
-When we don’t forget the reason for the season, it doesn’t matter what happens because it’s about him.
