At The Heart of Christmas (4)

Love

This is the last sermon of this series. We talked about Loy, Peace and Hope. Today, Christmas day, we are talking about Love.

We know Christ is love, but Mary displayed love in humbly givinger herself, her body, and possibly her marriage so that she could bring our savior into this world. She was the avenue God chose to bring the savior into world, but today.

You are Mary

When we receive Jesus Christ as Lord and savior we are imparted the word of God. We, Like Mary, carry Jesus. For 9 months Mary physically carried Jesus in her womb. But We carry Jesus in our hearts and it’s through love that we give birth to Jesus. We chose to to give birth to Jesus in our sharing of his word and our testimony to those who need to hear it.

Isaiah 7:14 ESV

14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

And we know that Immanuel means God is with us. To carry the Savior comes with great responsibility and I think the placement of Christmas is by no mistake. AS Christmas comes it ends an old year and marks the birth of the New Year. This new year brings new choices and new ways to love. The Birth of the Savior erases the past and brings hope to the future.

Newness

Luke 1:68–69 ESV

68 “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people 69 and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David,

Luke 1:77–78 ESV

77 to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins, 78 because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high

This year millions of dollars are spent on gifts, but we as Christians were given the greatest gift not only to receive on ourselves, but to share with other people.

This prophecy was given about Joh the Baptist. The first one who carried the message of the savior to the world and his main job was to bring the word about Jesus to other people why?

Luke 1:79 ESV

79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

We bring savation. We bring a new way of life everywhere we go and we can give this gift of a new life to anyone we come across. We can preach the joy of salvation with the word of testimony to anyone and everyone. We can bring the freedom from sin and death. We can help people lose shame and grief. We carry freedom.

Mary, through her selfless ability to love, brought Jesus into the world.

2. Disruption

We sing songs about a silent night. The manger scene is quiet and serene, but I have witnessed 5 births. My wife wasn’t a sceamer, but those days were anything but calm. to give birth you have to allow for the birth to disrupt your day. To share your love you have to allow the love to disrupt your day.

Shayne caused a lot of hospital trips. A lot of disruption. On the day of his birth it was pure chaos. They rushed my wife into the ER I sat outside the door not knowing if I would lose one or both of them that day. But when I held him for the first time my heart filled to the brim and I didn’t know what love was until then.

When we allow God to disrupt our life we stand with Mary when the angel told her:

Luke 1:37 ESV

37 For nothing will be impossible with God.”

We often misquote this verse because in context we realize that the angel is talking about bringing the savior into the world. Mary asked how will I birth Jesus and the angel answers there is nothing impossible with God.

You maybe facing an impossible situation, but the only answer there is to birth Jesus into your life. To allow God in the center of your life. To give him control of your life. I can’t tell you the countless times I prayed for people’s situations and God showed me—no you don’t pray for the situation you pray for the life. Because if I am in the middle of the live there isn’t a situation that I am not apart of.

3. Surrender

Luke 1:38 ESV

38 And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.

In order to carry Jesus in our lives and to those who need to hear of his word We need to surrender. When a women gives birth to a child she not only surrenders her body to carry the child she surrenders herself to the needs of the child.

Love drives the 2 am feeds. The diaper changes, the crying, the feeding. If we aren’t fueled by love we aren’t going to be motivated to finish what God has started.

“If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator; if our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist; if our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist; if our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer; but our greatest need was forgiveness, so God sent us a Savior.”

John 13:34 ESV

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.