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The Christmas Story From Revelation 5??? Series
Contributed by Kyle Gray on May 20, 2009 (message contributor)
Summary: Jesus is exactly who He says He is, the Christmas story told from Revelation Chapter 5
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With over 700 names and titles given to Him, all you need to do is Google His most popular name…Jesus… and you get 159 million hits!
Jesus of Nazareth is the most well known, most documented figure in all of history. Jesus has been the most studied person in human history. No historian would ever argue that Jesus did not exist…there is simply too much evidence! Universities and institutions have been founded for His cause. Countless people have given their lives in devotion to this man that claimed to be God. You can travel the world and not come across anyone who has not heard of Him.
He has been at the forefront of endless debates, skepticism, and controversy.
Whether you are at the Whitehouse Campus or here…You are all here because of your interest in Jesus.
His intentions to save mankind were coupled with a claim to be God. Anything less is making Jesus out to be something He wasn’t.
Jesus was born to Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem. We don’t know much about His adolescent life, except that He seemed to increase in wisdom and stature and He was sinless (Luke 2:52)
His ministry began at His baptism with John the Baptist (Mark 1:1-15) where He was quickly lead to the desert to be tempted by Satan himself. He selected 12 disciples to do life and ministry with. He claimed to be God and to be here to bring salvation to the world. He healed the sick and demon possessed. He preached of an everlasting life with His Father in a place called Heaven.
He offered this pardon from sin to everyone, much to the dismay of many of His fellow Jewish audience. He offered life after death in Heaven to people who weren’t Jewish…the gentiles. You and me.
He challenged the church, the how and what of peoples worship. He gathered enough of a following to alert the mighty Roman Empire. He claimed to be the King of the mightiest army in the universe, He claimed that the only way to be saved from hell was to believe in His own name. He had been the subject of many prophecies in the past; all were waiting for His arrival. All were focused on His promise to save, but not all were convinced the salvation would come after death…they were hoping for something different. They were hoping for their immediate rescue from the hand of the Romans. They were not satisfied.
As you know Jesus was betrayed by one of His closest friends, Judas…with a kiss. He was put on trial and found innocent by Pontius Pilot. But the Jews were not satisfied. They had shallow eyes. They had deaf ears. They had hardened hearts. They responded to the claims of Christ through sin filled hearts and blood stained hands. They sentenced Him to death by crucifixion. They hung Him between two guilty thieves, ridiculed Him and mocked Him. He died brutally, naked, in front of His own mother. His is the most talked about death in all of human history. For one reason.
His had meaning.
Death couldn’t hold Him and the grave wasn’t deep enough. The stone wasn’t big enough I guess. The Bible claims a resurrected King, a living God. A God with meaning, compassion and a plan for our rescue. But far too often…we’re not satisfied. We want more. We want rescue from our immediate situation.
Jesus was my age when He died!!!!! What He accomplished between the age of 30 and 33 changed to course of human history. Why did God the Father have to do something this radical?
Send His one and only Son…here…to a place that had rejected Him? To a people that were not satisfied, to a people who were more focused on the ‘doing’ of religion than they were on the One they were doing it for?
What sets Christianity apart is that God became human and died for mankind, so that we could have a second chance. Sin had us in its grip, hell had my name. We have a God that became human. This is impossible to fully comprehend. When we think of the sacrifice of Christ we often think of the cross…think about the sacrifice that it took to become human and leave His Fathers side in Heaven!!!!
The moment Eve’s lips touched that apple sin became a terminal disease to which there was no cure for. A perfect and holy God injected Himself with our disease to give us the cure, He became human to give us the cure.
Jesus was FULLY human!
God had a human body. He got tired like we do (John 4:6).
He got thirsty (John 19:28), He got hungry (Matt 4:2)
He died in a human body, rose from the dead in a human body, ascended to Heaven in a human body. He cried like we do, bled like we do.