Seed Of David Series

39 years ago, in late December of 1980, Wally Nelson awoke to find the body of a 19-year-old girl named Jean Hilliard frozen “solid as a log” on his doorstep. Her car had skidded off an icy road into a ditch, so she got out of the car and started walking to a friend’s house. She almost made it, having passed out on Wally’s porch, where she sat for six full hours in temperatures which reached 22 degrees below zero (Fahrenheit). Wally brought her to the hospital, where, to everyone's disbelief she was revived, with no more damage than a few blistered toes.

Hilliard became an instant celebrity. She toured local churches. Talk shows flew her to New York City to tell her story as the miracle girl from Lengby, Minnesota. She was even on the “Today Show” where Tom Brokaw interviewed her. But once the attention died down, Hilliard said the experience didn't really change the trajectory of her life. Almost everyone she knew told her she was saved by a miracle. So she said she kept waiting for something dramatic to happen. But her life's been normal.

She got married, had kids, and moved to a mid-sized town in central Minnesota where she works at Walmart. Things might have turned out differently, Hilliard said last year (2018), if she remembered the six hours she spent frozen in Nelson's yard, if she'd seen anything dramatic. “It's like I fell asleep and woke up in the hospital,” she said. “I didn't see the light or anything like that. It was kind of disappointing. So many people talk about that, and I didn't get anything.” (John Enger, “Frozen. Thawed. Not dead: Jean Hilliard's amazing Minnesota story”, Lengby, Minn., MPR News, January 25, 2018, www.mprnews.org/story/ 2018/01/25/jean-hilliard-northern-minnesota-frozen-survived; www.Preaching Today.com)

Hilliard experienced a miracle but became disappointed with her ordinary life. I think that describes a lot of people especially at Christmastime. They celebrate the miracle of Christmas; and yet, there is so much disappointment. Life hasn’t turned out like they expected, but that’s the story of the world!

For thousands of years, the world anticipated the arrival of a Deliverer, a Champion, a King, who would overcome all our problems and defeat all our enemies. But when He came, Mark Buchanan says, “He came to a man and a woman who were first migrants and then refugees. His first cries would have ricocheted off a stonewall in the back of a cave and startled dumb beasts. It wasn't the Advent we were expecting (Mark Buchanan, www. PreachingToday.com).

It was a disappointment to so many – so ordinary, so obscure. In fact, that’s why the Jews rejected their Messiah when He came. However, Jesus was so much more than anybody expected – He was the virgin-born, Son of God, who ends up saving people from their sins! That’s the miracle!

So how do you deal with the disappointment? Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to 2 Samuel 7, 2 Samuel 7, where the promise of Messiah comes in the context of disappointment.

2 Samuel 7:1-2 Now when the king lived in his house and the LORD had given him rest from all his surrounding enemies, the king said to Nathan the prophet, “See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent.” (ESV)

David didn’t think it was right to live in a palace, while His own Lord lived in a tent. He wanted to honor God by building Him a great temple! So…

2 Samuel 7:3 Nathan said to the king, “Go, do all that is in your heart, for the LORD is with you.” (ESV)

David wants to build a house for God, but look at how God responds.

2 Samuel 7:4-5 But that same night the word of the LORD came to Nathan, “Go and tell my servant David, ‘Thus says the LORD: Would you build me a house to dwell in? (ESV)

Answer: No.

2 Samuel 7:6-11 I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent for my dwelling. In all places where I have moved with all the people of Israel, did I speak a word with any of the judges of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, “Why have you not built me a house of cedar?” ’ Now, therefore, thus you shall say to my servant David, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep, that you should be prince over my people Israel. And I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you. And I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may dwell in their own place and be disturbed no more. And violent men shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel. And I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover, the LORD declares to you that the LORD will make you a house. (ESV)