The Word Became Flesh
Notes
Transcript
Opening Illustration
Opening Illustration
A man did not believe in all that incarnation stuff that the churches proclaim at Christmas time, so he stayed home while his family went to church on Christmas Eve.
Shortly after the family drove away in the car, snow began to fall.
He went to the window to watch the flurries getting heavier and heavier, then went back to his fireside chair and began to read his newspaper.
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Minutes later he was startled by a thudding sound.
Then another and another.
At first he thought someone must be throwing snowballs against his living room window.
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Well, when he went to the front door, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow.
They had been caught in the storm and in a desperate search for shelter they had tried to fly through his large landscape window.
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Well, he couldn't let the poor creatures lie there and freeze.
He remembered the barn where his children stabled their pony.
That would provide a warm shelter...
That is...
If he could direct the birds to it.
He quickly put on his coat and galoshes, trampled through the deepening snow to the barn, opened the door wide, and turned on a light.
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But the birds did not come in.
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He figured food would entice them in and he hurried back to the house, fetched bread crumbs, sprinkled them on the snow making a trail to the yellow lighted wide open doorway of the stable...
But to his dismay the birds ignored the bread crumbs, and continued to flap around helplessly in the snow.
He tried catching them, he tried shooing them into the barn by walking around them waving his arms...
Instead they scattered in every direction except into the warm lighted barn.
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Then he realized they were afraid of him.
To them, he reasoned, I am a strange and terrifying creature, if only I could think of some way to let them know they can trust me.
That I'm not trying to hurt them, but to help them.
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How?
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Any move he made tended to frighten them, confuse them.
They just would not follow.
They would not be led or shooed because they feared him.
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If only I could be a bird myself he thought.
If only I could be a bird and mingle with them and speak their language, and tell them not to be afraid, and show them the way to the safe, warm barn.
But I'd have to be one of them, so they could see and hear and understand.
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At that moment the church bells began to ring.
The sound reached his ears above the sound of the wind.
He stood there listening to the bells.
“O Come, All Ye Faithful.”
Listening to the bells pealing the glad tidings of Christmas.
And he sank to his knees in the snow.
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The incarnation made so much more sense to Him now...
The Son of God took flesh and came to be with us...
To save us!
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So, please turn your Bibles to the Gospel of John.
We will conduct our study in Chapter 1 and focus on verse 14.
Our message this morning is titled “The Word Became Flesh.”
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As you are turning to our passage today, please keep in mind this fact:
Today we cover the most amazing event in all of history:
The eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent, infinitely holy Son of God took on a human nature...
And He lived among humanity as one who was both God and man at the same time, in one person.
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So, this morning we will cover three main points:
1) The Word
2) The People
And...
3) The Grace
Opening Prayer
Opening Prayer
Before we consider our text, please join me in prayer...
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Heavenly Father...
You are a Good Father...
You sent Your Beloved Son into our broken world to save us...
You poured Your wrath on the One who is innocent to save us who are guilty.
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Help us to truly understand the importance of the Christmas message...
Help us to see the necessity of the incarnation...
Help us to not take for granted the mercy and grace You have provided us.
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Thank You for the precious gift of the Scriptures...
Thank You for the precious gift of the Holy Spirit...
Thank You for the precious gift of the Your Son.
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And it is in Jesus’ name we pray all these things...
Amen.
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Let’s turn to our text for today:
Reading of the Text
Reading of the Text
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
So, let’s look at our first point...
1) The Word
1) The Word
Verse 14(a): And the Word became flesh
Beloved, for those who believe or who are familiar with the story of Christ...
The statement that “the Word became flesh” may be very familiar to you...
You may have come across it or heard it hundreds of times...
But as the saying goes familiarity often breeds contempt...
Their is a loss of truly understanding the weight of a statement like “the Word became flesh.”
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We say it so many times...
We hear it proclaimed over and over again...
Especially at this time of year...
For some...
You may be growing numb to the fact that “the Word became flesh.”
That attitude of been there, done that...
Let’s move on to the next thing.
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However, I must protest, Beloved...
For the statement that “the Word became flesh” is actually so of the most shocking words ever recorded!
The fact that “the Word became flesh” is truly impossible to grasp with our human minds.
You see, as genuine believers...
We are saying that God the Son...
Who created all things seen and unseen...
The Alpha and Omega...
The King of Kings...
The Lord of Lords...
The Sovereign One...
The One and Only Beloved Son of God the Father took on flesh and became man like us!
This is mind blowing!
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior...
Is the God-Man!
He is fully God...
And at the same time fully human!
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As shocking and mind blowing as this fact is...
For the first five centuries of the history of the early church, it defended the true doctrine of the Incarnation.
During that time many erroneous teachings about the hypostatic union...
That is the union of the divine and human natures in Christ...
During that time many erroneous teachings were put forth, examined, and rejected.
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For example, some argued that Jesus did not have a human spirit, but rather that His divine spirit united with a human body.
That view preserved His deity, but at the expense of denying His full humanity.
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Others argued that the divine Christ-spirit entered the man Jesus at His baptism, and left Him before His crucifixion.
Another false view held by some was that Jesus was a created being, and thus inferior to God the Father.
Still others viewed Him as two separate persons, one human and the other divine...
According to that teaching Jesus was a man in whom God dwelt.
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All of those views (and others as well) erred fatally either by denying Jesus Christ’s full deity or His full humanity.
The true church, which is made of of genuine believers, rejected them all in favor of the biblical view of Jesus as the God-Man.
Again, meaning that Jesus is fully God and fully human.
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Pastor John MacArthur puts it like this:
“While Christ as God was uncreated and eternal, the word ‘became’ emphasizes Christ’s taking on humanity.
This reality is surely the most profound ever because it indicates that the Infinite became finite;
The Eternal was conformed to time;
The Invisible became visible;
The supernatural One reduced Himself to the natural.
In the incarnation, however, the Word did not cease to be God but became God in human flesh, i.e., undiminished deity in human form as a man.”
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Now, Beloved, the usual theological terminology used to describe this idea is the “incarnation.”
This is an English construct word from Latin that has come to mean “God incorporated in flesh.”
Although Christians may differ on a number of theological issues, the incarnation has been one of the few boundary doctrines that applies to all who are legitimately called by the name of Christ.
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So, one’s belief in the incarnation of Jesus Christ is not optional!
You get this wrong then you get the rest of your eternity wrong!
Just look at what 1 John 4:1–3 says:
1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,
3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
One must confess in the biblical Jesus...
That is the only Jesus that saves...
And the biblical Jesus was incarnated nearly 2,000 years ago.
As 2 Corinthians 8:9 says:
9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.
Likewise, take a look at Philippians 2:7–8 which says:
7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Now, this does not mean that the Word ceased being God...
Rather, the Word, who was God, also took on humanity.
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So, when Jesus took on flesh, He became fully human...
But the Son of God always existed...
For He had no beginning and has no end...
As John 1:1–3 says:
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.
So, Jesus is truly fully God and never ceased to be God.
As Colossians 2:9 makes clear:
9 For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,
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Now, the Expositor's Bible Commentary on John has a great note for us to consider, Beloved:
“The term Logos was used by the philosophers of the day, particularly the Stoics, to express the central principle of the universe, the spirit that pervaded the world, or the ultimate Reason that controlled all things.
John did not superimpose the philosophical concept on the person of Christ, but he adopted the Greek term as the best medium of expressing the nature of Christ.
As the preexistent Son of God, he was the Creator of the world and the Executor of the will of the Father.
As the incarnate Son of God, he exercised in his human existence these same powers and revealed effectively the person of the Father.”
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As Hebrews 1:3 says:
3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
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Now, what made the incarnation so incredible is that it meant that God would dwell with us in the flesh...
And that takes us to our next point.
2) The People
2) The People
Verse 14(b): And dwelt among us,
Beloved, let’s take a look at the word “dwelt,” which means “to pitch a tabernacle,” or “live in a tent.”
The term recalls to mind the Old Testament tabernacle where God met with Israel before the temple was constructed.
It was called the “tent of meeting” where “the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend.”
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Now, in the New Testament, God chose to dwell among His people in a far more personal way through becoming a man.
In the Old Testament, when the tabernacle was completed, God’s “Shekinah” presence filled the entire structure.
When the Word became flesh, the glorious presence of deity was embodied in Him.
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Thus, the coming of Christ fulfills the Old Testament symbolism for God’s dwelling with man in the tabernacle and the temple.
Later, through the Holy Spirit, Christ will make into a temple both the church and a Christian’s body.
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You see Beloved, in the past...
God sent us His prophets to warn us...
However, with the incarnation of Christ...
The Son of God in the flesh came to be with us and share with us the Good News...
Or as Hebrews 1:1–3 says:
1 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets,
2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.
3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
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God the Son taking on flesh and coming to dwell with us should have been a time of celebration...
The whole world should have praised His coming...
Especially His own chosen people...
But that was not the case...
The world that loved the darkness, was blind to the light that entered it.
2 Corinthians 4:4 puts it in pretty clear and bold fashion:
4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
Likewise, look at what it says in 1 Corinthians 2:8:
8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
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Look at our day today...
Is it any different?
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We are in the Christmas season...
And Christmas is only a few days away...
But what are most people really celebrating?
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True believers attend church regularly...
They love the Christmas season because it reminds them of what Jesus came into this world to do...
To die for our sins and save us.
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But to most of the world...
This is just the time of year where you can order a chocolate peppermint mocha at your favorite coffee shop...
And this is the time of year to watch all those classic Christmas movies like A Christmas Story, Home Alone, and...Die Hard...
And this is the time to build gingerbread houses and exchange gifts...
And a lot of that is not necessary bad...
Well, the chocolate peppermint mocha that might be considered bad...
But to the world that is Christmas...
A big marketing extravaganza where everyone spends a lot more money than they have!
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But Christmas is so much more than that, Beloved!
“The Word became flesh” and He “dwelt among us!”
Enjoy all the seasonal fun...
Even chocolate peppermint mocha...
But don’t be like the world and forget the whole reason for the season!
Don’t forget that that sweat baby in all those nativity scenes that everyone who is brave enough to display...
That that sweat baby boy will grow up and trade His soft swaddling blanket for few rusty nails and a crown of thorns!
That that sweat baby boy will grow up and endure the torture of the cross at the hands of the creatures He created!
That that sweat baby boy will grow up and will shed His blood for wicked and ruined sinners like you and me!
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Beloved, the world was blind when He first came into our world...
Today people are still blind to the fact that He is coming again...
Don’t be like the world and take your eyes off Him...
While your watching your favorite Hallmark Christmas movie and enjoying a warm sugar cookie...
Don’t forget why this is the most wonderful time of the year...
And celebrate our Lord and Savior who is full of grace and truth...
And that takes us to our third and final point.
3) The Grace
3) The Grace
Verse 14(c): And we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Beloved, although His deity may have been veiled in human flesh, glimpses exist in the gospels of His divine majesty.
The disciples saw glimpses of His glory on the Mount of Transfiguration as recorded in Luke 9:28–36, which says:
28 Now about eight days after these sayings he took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray.
29 And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white.
30 And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah,
31 who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.
32 Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him.
33 And as the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, “Master, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah”—not knowing what he said.
34 As he was saying these things, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud.
35 And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!”
36 And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen.
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Now, the reference to Christ’s glory, however, was not only visible but also spiritual.
They saw Him display the attributes or characteristics of God...
For example, the disciples saw Jesus display perfect grace...
Although we where rebels against Him, He had compassion on us or as Daniel 9:9 says:
9 To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him
The disciples saw Jesus display perfect goodness...
The disciples saw Jesus display perfect mercy...
The disciples saw Jesus display perfect wisdom and perfect truth and the list goes on.
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Jesus as God displayed the same essential glory as the Father.
That is due to the fact that although they are different persons they are one in being...
Along with the Holy Spirit we have the Trinity...
Three persons and one being.
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Now, the phrase “the only Son from the Father” or as some translations say “only begotten from the Father” has the idea of “the only beloved one.”
It, has the idea of singular uniqueness, of being beloved like no other.
By this word, John emphasized the exclusive character of the relationship between the Father and the Son in the Godhead.
It does not connote origin but rather unique prominence...
For example, this phrase was used of Isaac who was Abraham’s second son.
The ESV Study Bible puts it this way:
“The Greek word underlying ‘only,’ monogenēs, means ‘one of a kind, unique,’ as in the case of Isaac, who is called Abraham’s ‘one-of-a-kind’ son in Hebrews 11:17 (in contrast to Ishmael).”
Abraham had other sons...
Yet, it was Isaac who was the “unique” son, and the son of promise...
It was Isaac who was different in this sense from Abraham’s other sons.
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Jesus is the unique and beloved Son of God, sent from God to fully represent the Father on earth and reveal the Father and His plan for salvation in a previously unparalleled way.
The Son reflects the Father perfectly and perfectly carries out His will.
The close relationship of Father and Son means their works and will are in perfect unity.
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Next, let us take a look at “Grace” which indicates God’s unmerited favor that brings blessing and joy.
As Romans 5:14-15 says:
14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.
15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many.
Furthermore, when one pairs “grace and truth” it most likely recalls the Hebrew behind the phrase “steadfast love and faithfulness, where the expression refers to God’s covenant faithfulness to his people Israel.
The Reformation Study Bible puts it this way:
“When Moses saw God’s glory on Sinai, he heard the Lord proclaim His own name as the merciful God who is ‘abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,’ a divine self-description that is repeated in later Scripture.
The Word made flesh fully manifests the gracious covenant-making and covenant-keeping character of God.”
So, according to John the Beloved, God’s covenant faithfulness found ultimate expression in his sending of his one-of-a-kind Son, Jesus Christ.
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Additionally, New Testament scholar D.A. Carson says:
“The glory revealed to Moses when the Lord passed in front of him and sounded his name, displaying that divine goodness characterized by ineffable grace and truth, was the very same glory John and his friends saw in the Word-made-flesh.”
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The ultimate expression of glory is witnessed in Jesus’ death, resurrection, and exaltation.
This glory thus becomes the ultimate revelation of “grace and truth”:
Where the world’s hatred for God comes to its ultimate expression, so also does God’s love for the world.
This is seen powerfully is passages like Ephesians 2:4-5, which says:
4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
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Along with God’s grace...
We need God’s truth...
And the very definition of truth is found in the person of Jesus Christ...
As John 14:6 says:
6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Closing Illustration
Closing Illustration
So, as this message comes to a close...
I would like you to consider this:
Our world places little value on children, but Jesus says they are the most important people of all.
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Why?
Because to be little is to be great in God’s eyes, and to receive a child is like receiving Christ.
It’s a lesson Jesus wanted His disciples to learn, and it’s a lesson He wants us to learn, as well.
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When pastor and author, Clark Cothern, was five years old, he thought college presidents were powerful, frightening beings.
His mother was Dean of Women at Grand Canyon College (now a university) in Phoenix, Arizona, at the time, and he remembers playing behind her desk in the administration building.
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From there, he watched as students walked slowly down the hall toward the president’s office and stop.
They would rub their sweaty palms on their pants or skirts, take a deep breath, straighten their shoulders, and knock.
The door would creak open, and that’s when he would catch a glimpse of the president’s shiny, black wingtip shoes.
A steady, strong hand would reach through and shake the trembling hand of the student.
The student would then disappear inside the mysterious chamber known as “The President’s Office.”
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Cothern figured that walking into that room must be pretty much like going before the throne of judgment.
It was a terrifying thought, that is, until the day the president stooped into his world.
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He says, “I was playing with my toy car in the hall outside his office when the door opened.
There they were those shiny, black wingtip shoes.
The next thing I knew, President Robert Sutherland, the biggest man on campus, dressed in his pinstriped, three-piece suit, knelt down.
He placed the knee of his crisply creased trousers on the hallway floor.
‘May I have a turn?’ he asked.”
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After they played cars together, President Sutherland asked little Clark if he would do him the favor of calling him “Dr. Bob.”
Clark Cothern says, “That’s the day my opinion about college presidents changed.”
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Then he says, “I can see how some people might think God is a powerful, frightening being.
Yet after I met him, my opinion about him changed, too.
John 1:14 says, ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.’”
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Jesus stooped low into our world.
The greatest became the least and served the least among us, and that’s what He wants us to do as well.
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So, Beloved, as you count down the days until Christmas...
Enjoy your time with family...
Enjoy your all your new gifts...
Enjoy your warm drink and sweat treats...
But never take your eyes off the manger and the cross...
And take to heart was it says in passages like 1 Timothy 3:16 which says:
16 Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.
Closing Prayer
Closing Prayer
Let’s pray...
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Heavenly Father...
If anyone hearing this message right now does not know You in a saving way:
Then demolish any obstacles in their way of knowing You in a saving way.
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I appeal to Your Name’s sake!
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For those hearing this message who already know You:
Remind us to never stop thanking You for all You have done in our lives when You saved us from sure destruction.
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Again, I appeal to Your Name’s sake!
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It is in Jesus’ name we pray all these things...
To God be all the glory.
Amen.
