God Came Down to Us (John 1:14)
Pastor Jason Soto
The Characters of Christmas • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 15:50
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Video background: Film at Catalyst Church on stage, Christmas tree in the background, correct lighting. Use laptop with external camera and podcast microphone. Use cellphone as secondary camera.
I wish you and your family a Merry Christmas from our family and Catalyst Church.
I heard a story about a young mother and her little girl.
Stock video: Skyscrapers; little girl entering elevator; door opening at upper floor
She took the little girl to this big building that had an elevator. I’m from New York City, and in New York, you can tell the tourists because they are always looking up. They walk around looking at the tall skyscrapers.
The mother took the child into one of these skyscrapers, and they came to an elevator. The little girl went into the elevator and was surprised when the doors opened. She stepped out, and they asked the young girl, “How was your first ride in an elevator?” The girl said, “Mom and I went into this small box. We got inside, and the doors closed. When the doors opened, the upstairs came down!”
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In a way, that story represents what we celebrate at Christmas time. God came down to us. The Bible describes it as God becoming flesh.
Use scripture slide with Christmas background
It says in John 1:14:
14 The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
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The Word became flesh.
The Word became flesh.
John starts off by telling us that the Word became flesh. In other words, God came down to us and took on a human body. God thought enough of his creation he stepped into our place and our time and took on a human body. That is the miracle that we celebrate on Christmas day.
It’s a miracle that was predicted before Jesus was born. Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 7:14:
14 Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign: See, the virgin will conceive, have a son, and name him Immanuel.
You might wonder, why is the virgin’s son named Immanuel? That name Immanuel represents who this miracle baby will be. The word Immanuel means “God with us.” This baby boy, born to the virgin, will be God with us. That’s who Jesus is. He is the Word become flesh, God with us.
Not only did the Word become flesh, but also:
The Word dwelt among us.
The Word dwelt among us.
Not only did God take on flesh, but he came down to us and lived among his people. Imagine you spent time learning from a Rabbi. What would it take for you to go from, “This is someone I’m learning from,” to, “This is God in the flesh walking and talking among us?”
What would it take? Would you have to see that person heal the sick? Make the blind to see? Make the deaf to hear? Maybe you’d want to see him have control over nature, commanding the wind and the waves to stop? Maybe you’d want to see him raise the dead?
These words, that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, comes from someone who spent time with Jesus every day, and came to a place in his life, witnessing who Jesus is, that he is God. Listen to how he describes Jesus in a letter that we know of as 1 John, 1 John 1:1:
1 What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have observed and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—
God came down to us and dwelt among us. John says we heard him, we saw him, we observed him, we touched him with our hands. There is an excitement in him that God came down to us.
I know a woman who grew up listening to a famous female singer and performer. She loved this celebrity, and bought all of her CDs. This was before you could just stream them. She knew all of the songs and would talk to her friends about this celebrity.
One day, she was surprised. She attended a concert and her favorite celebrity was in the audience! She waited until after the concert, and went to the back of the club where the performance was. Out walked this woman who she had spent all of this time looking up to. She was not as impressive in person. She tried to say hi, but the celebrity couldn’t be bothered. She was rather rude and ignored her. She went right to her limousine and went away.
When you start to dwell among someone, who they are starts to become exposed. Often times, the person you spent time with doesn’t add up to the picture you had in your head.
But Jesus was different. The more time the followers of Jesus spent time around him, the bigger the picture of who he truly is grew in their hearts. This is true today. God came down to us, and the more time you spend with Jesus, the more you understand who he is, and the more excited you are.
The Word became flesh, dwelt among us, and:
The Word has the glory of God.
The Word has the glory of God.
John says this in John 1:14:
14 The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father. This is an amazing statement from John, who is a Jewish man from Israel. What is he saying? The God who came down to us, he is the glorious God of Israel. He is the God of the Scriptures, New and Old Testament. We observed the glory of God in Jesus Christ.
Glory refers to the radiant splendor, beauty, and perfection of who God is. The writer of Hebrews wrote about the glory of God in Jesus in Heb. 1:3:
3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
Glory is something that is intrinsic to God.
What does it mean that glory is intrinsic to who God is?
WATER is wet because that’s the way water is. Wetness is intrinsic to the nature of water. You can’t talk about sky without talking about blue because blue is intrinsic to the nature of sky. You can’t talk about sun without talking about hot because hot is intrinsic to the nature of sun. It is irrelevant whether you like the idea of the sun being hot, water being wet, or the sky being blue. The qualities are just intrinsically there.
God is glorious intrinsically. When you recognize it, He’s glorious. When you don’t recognize it, He’s glorious. When you like it, He’s glorious. When you don’t like it, He’s glorious because that’s just who He is. God’s glory is beyond human comprehension. It is beyond what you can conceive of.
Jesus has the glory of God, because he is God in the flesh. God came down to us.
The Word became flesh, he dwelt among us, full of God’s glory, and this last point:
The Word is full of grace and truth.
The Word is full of grace and truth.
What did the glory of God reveal in Jesus? When God came down to us, what did we see? We saw God in the flesh, full of grace and truth. It is a good thing that there is grace and truth in jesus Christ.
Grace is the undeserved favor of God. There’s nothing we could do to earn it or deserve it. Grace is something given from someone in a high position of authority to a person in a lower position. It is favor that comes not because you deserve it, but only based on the authority of who the person is giving it to you.
We are people who need the grace of God.
Not only is Jesus full of grace, he is also full of truth. Truth is something that is also intrinsic to who Jesus. Listen to how Jesus describes himself in John 14:6:
6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Jesus says he is the embodiment of truth. Why is that? Because he is God with us. When you know Jesus, you will know the kind of life that God has for you. Jesus says this in John 8:31-32:
31 Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you continue in my word, you really are my disciples.
32 You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
The miracle of Christmas is that God came down to us, and that through in faith, you and I don’t have to be enslaved to the old life we had. Knowing the truth of God in Jesus Christ will set you free and give you a new life.
The greatest Christmas present you could ever have is to know real life in Jesus Christ. The Bible says that if you put your faith in Jesus, the truth will set you free. God wants to give you a new life, and that is found through faith in Jesus. God has not left you alone. God came down to us. My prayer is that you would believe that today, and know the life that God has for you.
