Love Came
The Night Everything Changed • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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This is the fourth Sunday of Advent and we focus our minds on love.
This is one of my favorite pictures of my mom’s parents. Grandpa is putting together my first wagon.
I had the chance to live most of my life with them, our house was like the Waltons, full of family, and because of them full of love.
So my sister an I grew up around one big loving family.
The church is to be one big loving family as with a father who loves and is deeply concerned about His children.
Chair bible pg. 801
Let us read Titus 2:11-14
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people,
12 instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously, and in a godly manner in the present age,
13 looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,
14 who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, eager for good deeds.
Are you ready for the message God has for us today
Cool, let’s dig in.
The Appearance of Love
The Appearance of Love
The appearance of Christ brought God’s grace and salvation!
Not to just one people or nation but to all!
Why did God do this?
Let’s include Titus 3:4-5
4 But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared,
5 He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we did in righteousness, but in accordance with His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit,
Paul is teaching us that Jesus is the embodiment of God’s, grace, salvation, and love for mankind!
“Love” here is not agape. The Greek word for love here is actually translated in the phrase “love for mankind.”
This love is the quality of being marked or motivated by concern for the alleviation of suffering.
For so long the soul of man had been suffering in captivity to sin.
Then the Salvation and love of God appeared!
When we think of God’s love we think of agape, the love of service and sacrifice, which is certainly true of God.
However, this love is more about how God has always felt about that part of creation that bears His image.
How often do we even think about how concerned God is in wanting to alleviate our suffering in sin?
The word “appeared” means to give light, to illuminate, to shine upon.
The appearance of Jesus gives light to the concern of God for mankind.
It is such a wonderful thought.
A Renewed Relationship
A Renewed Relationship
The appearance of Jesus bringing Salvation and Grace ment the relationship between God man was reconciled.
How beautiful and wonderful.
The relationship requires trust and confidence in how God will answer our prayers and move in our life.
I went to Luke 1:34-37
34 But Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”
35 The angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; for that reason also the holy Child will be called the Son of God.
36 And behold, even your relative Elizabeth herself has conceived a son in her old age, and she who was called infertile is now in her sixth month.
37 For nothing will be impossible with God.”
Mary found all of this to wonderful to believe, yet Mary and Elizabeth were experiencing God doing the impossible.
37 For nothing will be impossible with God.”
Let us stay here are this verse and think about the God who loves us doing the impossible
The Bible is full of times where God did the impossible:
Abram and Sarah — nothing will be impossible with God.
The Ten Plagues of Egypt — water turning to blood, frogs, lice, flies, livestock pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness and the killing of firstborn children — nothing will be impossible with God.
The Red Sea — nothing will be impossible with God.
Water from a Rock — nothing will be impossible with God.
Raising evil Babylon to judge wicked Israel — nothing will be impossible with God.
Jesus walked on water — nothing will be impossible with God.
Jesus raised the dead. — nothing will be impossible with God.
Jesus resurrected from the dead! — nothing will be impossible with God.
In my own life God did what I thought was impossible - from barely graduating high school to getting a master’s degree — nothing will be impossible with God.
When we talk about how God has done the impossible in our life it can be hard to remain humble, like look at me!
However, we are to let our light shine in the darkness.
Just because we don’t know all the answers to all the mysteries of faith, why God moves and doesn’t move in peoples lives, doesn’t mean we should be shy about reminding the world that we have who can do the impossible. Emmanuel, God with us, has come to redeem the world!
Christmas reminds us that — nothing will be impossible with God.
Conclusion: c
That night in Bethlehem in a manger everything changed.
The love of God appeared as a little baby to demonstrate to the world that nothing will be impossible with God
Let’s pray.
Final Blessing After Song to Dismiss
May God, who sent His angels to proclaim the good news of the Savior’s birth, fill you with hope, peace, joy, and love. May you be heralds of the gospel. You are dismissed