The Joy Of Jesus

Introduction

Good morning and welcome to First Christian Church of Clemmons this morning. I am Pastor Shane and I am so excited to get to open the word of God this morning and look at a story you are all probably pretty familiar with. But if you aren’t, don’t worry you will be by the end of today! Go ahead and turn with me to Luke 1:26, which will be our starting point for today.

If you notice I have something on stage with me here. This we all maybe recognize as a nativity scene. Maybe you have one at your house. This one of course might be a little different, this one I actually stole from Tommy’s room. It is the Peanuts characters. And to be up front and honest, I love the Peanuts, Charlie Brown, Snoopy, etc. And I love watching the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. Whatever your opinion of it, it is one of the only things shown nationally this time of year that also includes the reading of a portion of scripture.

Anyways, I have this up here because we have all now definitely seen a nativity scene, but do we know or understand what is happening in this scene? Or have we become so used to seeing them, we forget what is happening here?

To get to the story of Luke 2, we actually need to start in Luke 1.

Read Luke 1:26-38

Luke 1:26–38 ESV

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God. And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” 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.

Pray

The Birth Foretold

To start our Luke 2 sermon we have to see how we got there. In Luke 1, in the middle of the story of Elizabeth and Zechariah that we looked at last week, we get 13 verses that will change the course of history forever. An angel appears to a relative of Elizabeth, a girl named Mary living in Nazareth and engaged to a man named Joseph. Here are two of the Nativity scene characters to start with.

Mary is given news that she initially can’t wrap her head around. Now to be fair, if an angel had appeared to me as a teenager to tell me something, I probably would have had some questions as well. She is called favored and told that the Lord is with her. Then told she will have a child and she will call his name Jesus. Verse 32 gives us some descriptions of Jesus that no other mother has ever been told about their child.

Now, Mary asks a very important question here. She is engaged to Joseph, but they are not married. So, how will this whole pregnancy thing work? Thankfully the angel gives us some insight and lets us know just enough. This baby will be from God. And the Holy Spirit and God will work to make this happen. And as a second sign to confirm this, your relative Elizabeth is pregnant.

So, two weeks in a row now we see a miraculous pregnancy. Elizabeth is old and well past the time of having children, but God does something only he can do and gives them a child. Here, Mary is young, some would say as young as 13, and God is up to something only he can do and have a virgin give birth. I said last week that Luke 1 and Luke 2 are a two part story, and intertwined with each other. We see that playing out here.

But this story is also wrapped around the Old Testament scriptures that point us to the coming savior. Isaiah is one of those Old Testament books, and if you have been coming to Tuesday morning Bible study while the study of Isaiah has been going on, you could have guessed that. It is rich with prophecy pointing to the coming Messiah, and even down to this important detail,

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14

That is right, Isaiah tells us that one indication that the messiah would be born is the mother would be a virgin. And notice the name Isaiah gives us, Immanuel. This name means “God with us.” This is God coming to be with his people in a way we maybe couldn’t comprehend. He is coming in the form of man, as a human, and God will be with us. Not distant, beyond our reach, but here with us.

Going Back To Bethlehem

There is another verse that gives us a clue about this coming messiah. In Micah chapter 5 and verse 2 we read this:

“But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, who coming forth is from old, from ancient days.”

Not only are we told the miraculous nature of how Mary would conceive, but in Micah we are told the town that the Savior would be born in. Bethlehem is not a booming metropolis that was super significant. In fact, when the book of Micah was written, it was just a few hundred people that lived there. Only 5 miles from Jerusalem, but when the land was divided amongst the tribes in the time of Joshua, Bethlehem wasn’t even significant enough to be listed among the towns.

Bethlehem is a small town. Not a significant or impressive town. I get this! I grew up mostly in the town of Loganville, Georgia. I know, a town you all are super familiar with. It is east of Atlanta on highway 78, did that help? There isn’t much significant about that town, and most people have never heard of it, so most times I will tell people I grew up in Atlanta. There, a town we may have heard of before. I can imagine the people of Bethlehem doing something similar, trying to explain where they live and eventually just saying on the south side of Jerusalem.

God uses places that man so often overlooks. Not only will Bethlehem be the birth place of Jesus, but it is the home of King David as well. On paper, it is a town that you could pass over, but God doesn’t care about the size of the town, the church, or the person. He isn’t looking at the outside attributes but the nature of the heart of the servant. Don’t think that because you don’t “feel” important, that God won’t use you. He does not care how important you think you are, He cares about your willingness to serve Him.

In Luke 2 we see this promise come to reality. Read Luke 2:1-7 with me. A census is called, and people must return to their family home town to be counted. Joseph and Mary travel to Bethlehem. While there, it comes time for this baby to be born. Of course, no room in the inn so they give birth and place the newborn savior in the manger, the feeding trough of the animals.

Luke 2:1–7 ESV

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

Now, we have the next part of our Nativity scene. Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus and the manger. While we do not know the exact nature of what this manger would have been, whether a barn, a cave being used as a barn, or something else, that is not the point here. The humble servant savior is born not in a palace, or on the doorstep of the Temple, but in a barn in a small town.

Of course, after a baby is born we have to let people know! I can remember when Tommy was born, making calls, sending texts, and receiving visitors to see us and the new baby. In fact, Tommy was early so people were bringing their gifts they intended to give us at the baby shower the following week so we could get out of the hospital. The news spread quick. But in Bethlehem 2,000 year's ago, there were no text messages, phone calls, or emails. So, who finds out?

The Shepherds

Starting in verse 8 through 14 we see who finds out about the birth of our savior. The shepherds are out tending their sheep. Watching over and protecting them. Suddenly, in the dark of night, a bright light appears and from this light an angel appears to talk to them, and to tell them the great news. The messiah has been born. They do not have to fear that these angels are appearing, they bring good news! They bring the greatest news ever, that our savior is born.

I find it very interesting that the angel tells them this, “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.” They can fear not, because the message they bring is not one of fear or destruction, but of hope. They bring good, wonderful, amazing, hopeful news. The Savior is born, and not just the savior for their town, or for shepherds, or even just for Israel, but for the world.

The shepherds take the advice of the angels and head to Bethlehem to see what the angels had told them. They were to look for a baby, wrapped in swaddling clothes, laying in a manger. These shepherds would have been very familiar with a manger. They were around animals all the time, they were there when they were fed. In fact, it is believed that houses at that time would have been 2 storied, and the bottom story would have been essentially a barn, meaning that even when they were not out in the fields with these sheep, they would be living with them. They were all too aware of what a manger would be. But they would not have expected to find the new King laying in one.

What is their reaction to finding this? Verse 20 says that they “returned, glorifying and praising God.” Isn’t it crazy that simply being in the presence of Christ, to be witnesses to the first hours of God in flesh, changed them. And possibly even more miraculous, 2,000 year's later that baby is still changing lives.

Our series has been looking at the joy that we find in different characters and stories in the Bible. Today we have seen a few different people. The joy of Mary giving birth to the savior, the joy of the shepherds, lowly shepherds, being the first people to know of the birth, and coming to see the new King laying in a manger. The joy of the Messiah being spoken about in books like Isaiah and Micah, and now that coming to fruition in the first chapters of Luke. The joy that God was not silent or distant from His people, but here was God in flesh. God with us.

The greatest joy is this, that this great news was not just for a small, select, group. This was good news for the world. The world could rejoice in the good news that Jesus was here. The world could know that God sent His son to this earth. We could know what it means to have salvation.

If it hadn’t been for Easter, nobody would ever have dreamed of celebrating Christmas.

N. T. Wright

What is the significance of remembering the birth of Jesus? Because of the birth of Jesus, we know that we will have the death of Jesus. And through his death we can have salvation. Yes Jesus was born, and yes Jesus will die. But it is through that death that we can find life. But, here in the darkest time of year, we can celebrate that the light was brought into the world. We can rejoice, the savior is born!

While in a few days we may gather to give gifts to each other, know that the greatest gift ever given was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a feeding trough. He did not have heads of state or the news at his bedside, but angels announced his birth and shepherds came to praise him.

The greatest gift for you and me was Jesus dying for our sins and offering us salvation. And that gift is still offered today. If you have never accepted Christ as your savior, I would love to speak with you today.