King has come2

Phil. 2:5-8 "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross."

Last time we saw that Christmas didn't really begin in Bethlehem with the birth of the baby Jesus in a manger.

Those things were only the fulfillment of what had already been decided and decreed before the universe was even created!

The Apostle Peter writes, "God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but now in these last days he has been revealed for your sake" (1 Pet. 1:20).

I know this is a mind twister....but it's true.

Way before Bethlehem and the manger, and long before Gen.1:1 took place, and reaching further still into endless eons of unmeasurable time, God chose Jesus to be our ransom.

This is where and when Christmas was first conceived...

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And we also saw that Jesus was not some first century flower child walking around in sandals with long brown hair, saying poetic type things that made people feel all warm and fuzzy...

We are told He was "in the form of God..."

2: 6 "...who, being in very nature God..."

2: 6 "...who, though he was God..."

So, the Christmas presented in the Bible has little to do with Christmas trees and white snow, reindeer and lights, shopping and all the things we associate with December 25.

Christmas is about the miraculous moment when God the Son left heaven to become one of us.

Paul the Apostle wrote, "It is quite true that...Christ...came to earth as a man..." (1 Tim. 3:16).

John wrote, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14).

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You know, we talk a lot about the journey Joseph and Mary made from Nazareth to Bethlehem, which was about 120 miles.

And we discuss how far the wise men from the east--probably Persia--had to travel in order to reach Bethlehem, around 800 miles requiring almost 2 years of travel.

But the Lord Jesus came much, much further than this to reach us!

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ILLUS: In Africa a missionary teacher did her best to explain the meaning of the Christmas holiday to her children.

As a part of her explanation she told them that Christians give presents to each other at Christmas as a way of symbolizing that God the Father gave mankind the greatest gift of all in Jesus Christ.

One boy in particular seemed fascinated by her words. When Christmas day came, that boy brought the teacher a gift of an extraordinarily beautiful sea shell.

When she asked him, “Where did you find such a beautiful shell?” he told her that shells of that kind could only be found in one place, in a bay several miles away.

She said, “But you shouldn’t have gone that far just to get a gift for me.”

He answered in his broken English, “Long walk part of gift.”

When we think about all that Jesus gave up, and how far He came--from heaven to earth--we too can say "long walk part of gift!

As 2 Corinthians 8:9 puts it:

"For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich."

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The miracle of Christmas is that, for some 33 years God moved into our neighborhood...

The Bible says that He “made his dwelling among us.”

Jesus was born in Bethlehem and grew up in Nazareth.

He belonged to a family, He grew up normally, He played with His little friends in the streets of Nazareth.

He went to school and was faithful in the worship of the synagogue.

He worked with his hands in His father’s carpenter’s shop, and learned the skills of the trade.

He lived among the people, He attended weddings and funerals...

He saw their hopes and their dreams, their disappointments and their sorrows.

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And In some indefinable way He ADDED manhood without SUBTRACTING deity.

He was fully God and fully man—the God-man.

The love of God now beat in a human heart.

The wisdom of God now spoke from human lips.

Jesus was God wrapped in skin.

When God took upon Himself a human form, He didn't live above us, or beneath us, or away from us...but WITH us!

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Now today we're going to look at something else that jumps out of Phil. 2: 6---the stunning unselfishness of Jesus...

It says in 2:6b "(Jesus)...did not consider it robbery to be equal with God..."

"(Jesus)...did not demand and cling to his rights as God," Living Bible

"Instead, He gave up his divine privileges..." New Living Translation

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Watch this: In order to redeem us, Jesus let go of what He had in glory with the Father...

One commentator says, "He did not regard his equality with God as an object of covetous desire; though he possessed the divine nature, he did not eagerly seek to retain his equality with God."

But instead, He stepped out of glory and made that longest of journeys in order to become one of us.

Jesus Himself tells us that this was His decision within the framework of God's will...

John 10:17-18 "This is why the Father loves Me, because I am laying down My life so I may take it up again. 18No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down on My own. I have the right to lay it down, and I have the right to take it up again. I have received this command from My Father."

In other words, our Lord Jesus was COMPLETELY UNSELFISH!

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It is Jesus's unselfishness Paul had in mind just 2 verses earlier when he encouraged us as Christians,

"Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but for the interests of others. Let THIS MIND be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus..." (2:4-5)

Jesus did not think of Himself first, He thought of us...

He did not put Himself first, or His own interests ahead of ours...which rocks my world!

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Let me point out a few of the things Jesus gave up when He left heaven to come and rescue us from sin and destruction....

The first thing Jesus gave up was...

His heavenly body.

Paul says of Him, "Who, being in the form of God..."

Whatever that means, I think it's safe to say that Jesus gave up His heavenly body...

Whatever the "form of God" Paul describes was comprised of, He gave that up.

It might have been a body like the one He had after His resurrection...

He walked through closed doors,

He would suddenly appear in a room from nowhere,

He was not subject to gravity in that when He ascended back to the Father He simply floated up into the clouds while the disciples watched in awe!

But even more than all that, before Jesus left heaven He existed as the very essence of God, which we can't begin to reconstruct in our finite thinking.

Jesus gave up His heavenly body or form in order to wrap Himself in human flesh with all of its restrictions and limitations.

But long walk part of gift!

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The second thing Jesus gave up was...

II. The glory He had had with the Father.

"And now, Father, reveal my glory as I stand in your presence, the glory we shared before the world began" (John 17:5).

Now, in saying He gave up the glory He had with the Father, I'm not saying He gave up His DEITY......He never did that!

He remained all God while on earth....His "Godness" was simply concealed by the flesh He lived in.

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Nor did Jesus become a sinner on the Cross...

He was our "sin sacrifice" but never did the Lord Jesus experience a fallen nature that needed to be born again like we did....

But we DO know that He left heaven and the glory he enjoyed there in order to be born of a woman, live amongst us, die for our sins, and rise from the dead!

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What might that "GLORY" have been?

Well, we know that in heaven, Jesus was the adoration of the angels.

He existed in an inconceivable environment un-stained by sin, unspotted by flesh, undisturbed by trouble...

And we know that Heaven is a place where the high praises of God endlessly echo from one corner to the other.....where celestial beings of light come and go at the Father's command...

In that glorious heaven, Jesus was equal to the Father, and enjoyed a bliss and ecstasy we cannot begin to fathom.

Jesus left this glory and so much more to become one of us!

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But probably the most humbling aspect of Jesus’s departure from heaven is that...

III. He gave up His dignity

Think about it: In the heavenly realms, Jesus was all-loved and all-worshipped and all-respected.

But on earth He intentionally put himself into the hands of his own creation, and the result was the opposite of heaven...

When He arrived here, Herod hated Him, the Scribes ignored Him, and there was no room for Him in the inn.

Only the shepherds, the Wise Men, the poor, and foreigners welcomed Him to this Earth.

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And not much has changed today, as we see the significance of the birth of Jesus increasingly slip away from our cultural awareness.

John said, "He came into the world He created, and the world did not know Him.” (John 1:10)

He was born into a borrowed feeding trough in a borrowed stable---He gave up all the trappings and furnishings of God.

Then, as a child just like us, Jesus submitted himself to the authority of his parents.

And to his teachers.

And to the Roman soldiers.

And to the government--Jesus paid his taxes (Matthew 17.24-27).

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Jesus left more than you and I will ever know because He was UNSELFISH, thinking of us more than Himself.

And He came a great, great distance in order to reach us...

But long walk part of gift!

Now, even though Jesus came so far to reach us, He asks that we take only ONE STEP toward Him...

The step of repentance, the step of saying, "Jesus, come into my life and heart, forgive me my sin...I acknowledge you as Savior and Lord.