Here’s a Christmas treat as some things can really grab our attention
Clip: The Bible Project Luke _part1.mp4 4:18
Jesus is here to bring salvation by turning our world order upside down
When we come today wrapping up Christmas for another year. What’s going to be the one thing you hope surprises you most? Maybe that something has happened already. I’ve always noticed the things that surprise us get our attention. Like when God comes to wrap up Christmas, he comes giving a very real present, a gift of far greater worth than the most expensive one we could ever buy today. Here we come to Christmas day. The question is what is it God would have us know about life. Because this isn’t a story where we’re left wondering about what on earth God’s on about, we don't get a story in abstract. The birth of Jesus comes in a time of real crisis. Mary and Joseph meet with some real obstacles, having to arrive in Bethlehem for the census that Caesar Augustus ordered to be counted. They had made no arrangement for the other end of the trip when they set out on foot for the journey. They also had no living relatives living in town. They were simply on their own. The only place left was the shed out back where the animals got accommodation. So the heavily pregnant Mary and the nervous first time father Joseph settle down for the night that would change everyone’s lives. John speaks about the moment of the birth of Jesus with wonder
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
The Word becomes flesh, entering into a fixed point in time and history. The Word takes on life. The gospel is a story about the intimacy of God. The relational God who comes personally speaking into this world he’d made. Jesus is on the record as someone we can hear. We’re told His story goes back beyond time itself. When Jesus speaks he transforms the chaos into the cosmos. He takes that want and waste of our lives and transforms us into the forgiven. He takes our brokenness and turns it into holiness. It is Jesus bringing the presence of God into a broken fallen messed up world with sin and sorrow, where we meet with all that we struggle with; and a deceit that says the only voice we need to hear is our own. So it was in Bethlehem with real animals, surrounding a poor wooden cradle they were used to getting their feed from, instead holds a little new born baby, who is the most wonderful gift we could ever imagine or see. The birth of Jesus is like a dark room suddenly filled with light. Verses 3-5
3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Like it was for the shepherds out on the dark cold night who get taken by surprise by the night sky filled with angels. The sky lights up and all they can do is fall down to the ground
Like dead men – terrified. Hard working men filled with fear. It took a while to talk them down.
9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. 11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. 12 This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” Luke 2:9-12
For the shepherds out in the field that night they got the wrap on Christmas. It got their tongues wagging for anyone who would listen, here’s what they said
20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
Here also John gets us seeing where God becomes a man, lives a life of love, dies a death of love, is raised to indestructible life. Here’s the real challenge this Christmas. The question is as we wrap up Christmas for another year, is what room has Jesus in your life right now? Do you have that nagging doubt that you want to know if you are Christ’s? Then ask yourself , am I caught up, however imperfectly, however groping, in this story? Do I identify myself with Jesus that I am part of what’s happening or are you on the outside hoping that if you ignore reality long enough it will go away? [1] We have been given an inexpressibly wonderful gift, the best, and nothing can take away in Jesus No suffering can separate you from God’s love[2]
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Go back to the start of time and we find we are not lost in a void where there is nothing , we are in the space in which God lives. Our world being made was no divine accident. We were not the remnants of an afterthought. Look again at that first verse of John 1. Notice the repetition: WORD, WORD, and WORD. In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God, Word was God. Jesus is as personal as any word gets. So when you unwrap the presents and sit around the table of food; or get the phone calls from far away, will the real gift today be Jesus with us? Not far away, or uncaring in his love. Jesus is the word who reveals life to the full for us today. Put your life into his hands. Jesus who for us would go through loss and weakness and hardship and sorrow and death. He did it to set before us the joy of God. He did it for love. He did it to show us the glory of God in the face of Christ. In Jesus we find the universe wasn’t created supremely about you and me it was created for the express joy of Jesus. So everything counts as God makes us fit the story of life in just the right size. That in Jesus we receive the best gift we can ever have. A gift that can never be taken away. A gift of life that will continue to work out the whole journey long. Will we let the light of Jesus shine on this Christmas? Can I say it’s the best way to wrap up Christmas for another year I can think of! Lets pray.
God open my ears. I don’t clearly hear your care and compassion when you tell me not to worry or be afraid, but I know they are there. Father, open my eyes. I act like I see all reality. I act like I can see even more than you do. But I am seeing now that there is an entire world that is blurry to me, and that world is you. It is you I don’t see well. I want to trust in what you say and see the things you have revealed. That leaves m no choice but to start with humility. This is the way all journey’s with you begin. Please teach me humility so that what you say overrules what I feel.”[3] As we celebrate your birth Lord Jesus.
AMEN
David Hassan @ Tamworth Community Presbyterian Church 25/12/17
[1] David Powlinson Who is God p10. The Journal of Biblical Counseling • Volume 17 • Number 2 • Winter 1999
[2] David Powlison “Predator, Prey, and Protector: Helping Victims Think and Act from Psalm 10 “
The Journal of Biblical Counseling • Volume 16 • Number 3 • Spring 1998 p.36.
[3] Welch, Edward. Running Scared. Greensboro, NC. New Growth Press, 2007, p70