Christmas Sermon - 1 Timothy 2:5-6
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Tank Membership Intro at Beginning?
We could go a lot of different places for a sermon on Christmas Day – a day celebrating Jesus birth.
(For all you facebook and meme believers out there, our celebrating this day as Jesus birthday has nothing to do with Mythras a pagan God, or Pagan festival Saturnalia which was never on Dec 25, or Winter Solstice which is Dec 21st – we know Christians were celebrating this day as the day of the birth of Jesus as early as 336 – early church tradition (not Bible) that Jesus was conceived on the same day that he died, same calendar day, March 25 – 9 months later) Is it actually his birthday, unlikely, but it very well may be close – and either way, its not abnormal to celebrate a birthday on a day that isn’t actually that day . . .
Gospels and the story itself – King of Kings became an infant and had no room in the inn
John 1 – LOGOS – “universe (today’s language)”
Phil 2 – Though He was God, He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. . .
Col 1 – Image of the Invisible God – all things created by him and through him, in Him the fullness of God was pleased to dwell
The truth is, what we celebrate today is one of the most crucial aspects of Christian theology, the reality that God became man, so that man could know God. Not just appearing like a man, not just putting on a human jacket, but took on a human body, a human mind, a human will, a human heart, becoming like us in every respect.
We have just begun a series in the book of 1 Timothy, so our Christmas passage this morning will be from 1 Timothy.
For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
Song/Creed?
2 Key MASSIVE THEOLOGICAL IDEAS to see here about this key phrase - THE MAN CHRIST JESUS - why say it that way? Emphasizing the man.
He became a Man to be our Mediator
He became a Man to be our Mediator
“The achieving of fellowship and reconciliation between separated parties”
The reason that Christ became the God-Man - 2 natures
Because we were separated from God
The modern idea that you can just close your eyes and communicate with the divine, get access to the ear of the LOGOS, is only a product of Christianity, and its probably an unfortunate product, because we have culturally lost the AWE that every ancient culture had about the divine. God is UTTERLY TRANSCENDENT (Holy) - The only Uncreated Being or Thing, the Only Eternal Being, the Uncaused Cause, the Unmoved Mover, The only One TRULY Holy - HOLY HOLY HOLY
To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
1 Timothy 6:16 (ESV)
who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
He is infinite, He is Separate, He cannot know Sin, there is a barrier between us and Him that we simply cannot cross, if we so much as look at Him we die, touch his mtn.
Noone is righteous, no not one - if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves - all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God
NOW WHAT??
We know 2 things to be true if we can ever know God
1. We must have a go between.
2. One of us can’t be It.
This was pictured in the Old Testament by the Priest.
Mediation was the chief task of the Priest - he was the go between, the one that made things right between the people and God, but he could never do it once and for all, he had to keep going back and offering bulls and goats, year after year after year. Into the Holy Place to offer sacrifice for sins. Blood has always been the way reconciliation occured. We know now that those sacrifices weren’t actually covering sin, they were just rolling it forward in time until Christ.
The Priest We Needed
The Priest We Needed
But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
Hebrews 9:24 (ESV)
For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.
He couldn’t be that Mediator as only God, he had to become Man to be both sides representative.
Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
Colossians 1:20–22 (ESV)
and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him
He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
An intermediary must be able to represent both sides equally. This was Job’s longing:
For he is not a man, as I am, that I might answer him,
that we should come to trial together.
There is no arbiter between us,
who might lay his hand on us both.
He became a Man to be our Ransom
He became a Man to be our Ransom
who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
A ransom was the price paid for the release of slaves or captives. Still in our day hijackers hold people to ransom. The word implies that we were in bondage to sin and judgment, unable to save ourselves, and that the price paid for our deliverance was the death of Christ in our place.
For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
This teaching is referred to today as “Substitutionary Atonement” - We were held captive by Sin, Sin was our Master, and the only way to free us from this Master was to pay a massive ransom - the price of the perfect sacrifice - the sacrifice that didn’t exist and couldn’t exist by our hands. God knew the only one that was capable of paying the price was Himself. So he GAVE HIMSELF FOR US.
who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father,
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,
who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.
He gave himself. His death, far from being an unexpected, senseless accident, came about because God was in full control of the situation. Christ’s death is integral to God’s redemptive plan.
John 10:18 (ESV)
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.”
Acts 2:23 (ESV)
this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.
And they sang a new song, saying,
“Worthy are you to take the scroll
and to open its seals,
for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God
from every tribe and language and people and nation,
If Jesus didnt become human, be physically born, have actual blood pumping through his veins, he never could have paid the ransom to free us.
All you have to do for that ransom payment to be applied to you is believe and submit to Him as King. Nothing is keeping you from the waters of baptism but that.
Don’t get it mixed up here on Christmas Day, unlike how many Christians believe, Jesus is not just a higher version of Santa Clause, who gives you what you deserve based on if you do enough good things, if you’re a good enough boy or girl to get presents instead of coal, heaven instead of hell.
Christianity is not White bearded God watching from the Northiest North Pole, to see if youre good enough . . .
YOU WILL NOT DO ENOUGH, YOU CANNOT DO ENOUGH.
God doesn’t just see when you are sleeping and when you are awake, HE SEES YOUR VERY HEART, THOUGHTS . . .
Deep down you KNOW you aren’t holy enough to be welcomed by the Holy God
Jesus came because he knew that too. Santa gives you what you deserve (allegedly), God gives you what Christ deserved.
Santa doesn’t get involved, he stands back as a judge . . . Jesus came from Heaven to Earth for you, and then enters into you to help you be more like him, to help you do the good things that prove that you really are His.
You think SANTA is great!?
Christmas is one of those times that we are also reminded how pain and joy often coincide as humans . . .
I shall ransom them from the power of Sheol;
I shall redeem them from Death.
O Death, where are your plagues?
O Sheol, where is your sting?
Compassion is hidden from my eyes.
And the ransomed of the Lord shall return
and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
they shall obtain gladness and joy,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
Today when you gather with your family, or this past week, know that that is not the end, that truly that is but a taste of the kind of family gathering that is to come, because Jesus came in the flesh to be our mediator and our ransom.