Heart of Christmas-Part III

We are looking this morning at the third part of a 5 part sermon series titled The Heart of Christmas. As we have been preparing our hearts for the arrival of our Lord and Savior we have looked at having a heart of faithfulness, a heart of joy, and this morning we are going to look at, what I would say is, the most important element of the heart of Christmas which is the heart of Humility, Having a humble heart. Each of these elements and even the next two elements we will look at next week all have their origin or their source in Christ. They don't come from us. Faithfulness in a person is the ability to trust wholeheartedly in God and His promises. To trust God comes from looking at the fact that He is faithful and keeps His promises. Because He is faithful and our faithful heart comes from the Spirit of God giving us the assurance that we can trust His promises. Having a joyful heart is not natural to man, man because of sin is naturally bitter and grumbles and complains, always seeking joy or happiness in this life and never finding it because true joy can only come from the One who is in control of all things and that One is God. He is the source of our joy and even when our circumstances are in human terms flipped turned upside down we can have Joy that God is still in control and we can faithfully follow Him knowing He works all things together for the good of those who are called according to His purpose. Each of these elements are foreign to us and they each require us to be tapped into the source. This morning as we look at humility we will see once again this is a foreign concept to mankind even those saved by God's grace but prayerfully as we examine this attribute of the heart of Christmas we will walk away understanding a little deeper and being a little closer to the source of this attribute.

We will find this attribute of the heart of Christmas in Luke 1:67-79. Let's go ahead and turn to Luke 1:67-79.

Luke 1:67–79 NASB95

67 And his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, saying: 68 “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, For He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people, 69 And has raised up a horn of salvation for us In the house of David His servant— 70 As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old— 71 Salvation from our enemies, And from the hand of all who hate us; 72 To show mercy toward our fathers, And to remember His holy covenant, 73 The oath which He swore to Abraham our father, 74 To grant us that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies, Might serve Him without fear, 75 In holiness and righteousness before Him all our days. 76 “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go on before the Lord to prepare His ways; 77 To give to His people the knowledge of salvation By the forgiveness of their sins, 78 Because of the tender mercy of our God, With which the Sunrise from on high will visit us, 79 To shine upon those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, To guide our feet into the way of peace.”

Luke introduces us to Zacharias' song here. Luke only provides the pronoun here of 'his father' without knowing the context one wonders who's father is Zacharias, well he is John the Baptist's father. Once John the Baptist was born Zacharias received his voice back and he being filled with the Holy Spirit which means he was controlled or lead by the Holy Spirit to prophesy and sing this song which he is about to sing. What is important here is this is a song by a man who was humbled by God because he didn't trust God's word because he asked God for a sign as to how he could know Elizabeth was going to have a son. The sign Zacharias recieved was becoming mute, he could not speak until the birth and circumcision of John. It wasn't until he named John that he was able to speak again. Now not only does Zacharias speak but he sings a song that is a prophecy of God's passed work, His present work and His selection of John for a humble work of going before Jesus to prepare the way of the Lord. It takes a humble servant to prepare the way for someone greater then yourself and John does this marvelously and Zacharias' song is one that should prepare our hearts for humility before a powerful God who chose people for His purpose and it is through humility that we submit in serving Him.

Have a humble heart for Jesus' Visitation, Preparation and Our Submission

So we are to have a humble heart and the example of a humble heart is Christ in His Humble Visitation.

Humble Visitation

As we begin looking at a humble heart we first look at the source of humility. Understand this one very important point in respect to all of these elements of the heart of Christmas there is one source and the source has nothing to do with us. The source is the One whom we are preparing to celebrate it is in and through Jesus Christ. It is through Jesus Christ that Joseph has a faithful heart, it is through Christ that Mary has a Joyful heart and it is through Christ that Zacharias has a Humble heart. All of these elements are in respect foreign to the human heart. Man is filled with doubt, misery and pride but Jesus has the power to change all of that. He has done the work in Joseph to transform his heart from doubting his wife's claim of fidelity and being pregnant with the child of God. God has done the work of transforming the heart of Mary from misery in what lies ahead of her into Joy in what God is doing. And as we approach Zacharias we will find this man who had some pride and felt he deserved more of a sign from God then just an angel coming and telling him he would have a baby had his heart humbled by God by becoming a mute. Never think that any of these elements of the heart of Christmas can ever come from you, they are expression or the outworking power of the One who works within you. When we express these emotions we are expressing the transforming power of the one who is working mightily within us. They are foreign to us because the sin within us drives us to do the exact opposite of what the heart of Christmas is all about. We are preparing our hearts for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and we need to be sure we are tapping into the source of the heart of Christmas and the source is Christ Himself.

Zacharias tapped into this source, or should I say the source tapped into him. Zacharias' son John has been born to them and it is about nine months or so since this man was made a mute because of his doubting proud heart. I would even say it was close to a year that he had not said a word and this gave him plenty of time to reflect on God's power and majesty. He has been transformed by the power and the work of God and the first phrase we find from this man is, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel." The Greek for this word 'blessed' is different from what we found last week with Mary. Mary said that all generation would consider her blessed, that is people would see her as happy or fortunate because of what God is doing in and through her to bring about His sovereign plan. The word used here by Zacharias for 'blessed' is only used of God. It is a word that means He is worthy of praise, or "Praise God." It is a recognition of God's power and might and an acknowledgement of His work. It is an expression of Humility. Zacharias is completely transformed here. Especially if you compare this to his first encounter with the angel.

Luke 1:18 NASB95

18 Zacharias said to the angel, “How will I know this for certain? For I am an old man and my wife is advanced in years.”

Zacharias is standing in the temple to burn incense and as he is there the angel appears to him and tells him he is going to have a child and instead of responding with praise he responds with a question which is an expression of doubt and of pride. Doubt that God is in control and pride in demanding a sign from God. God is not here to do our bidding we are here to humbly submit to Him. Now Zacharias has changed his tune, not by his own power mind you it is through the power of the Holy Spirit who is the One who renews the mind and transforms the heart. Here is Zacharias humble gratitude in who God is.

He continues by saying, "For He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people, (69) And has raised up a horn of salvation for us In the house of David His servant- (70) As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old- (71) Salvation FROM OUR ENEMIES, And FROM THE HAND OF ALL WHO HATE US;

Notice how when Zacharias speaks of the visitation and the redemption being accomplished it is in passed tense, as though it has happened. What he is actually saying in the Greek or the idea behind this phrase is not so much a passed event that has occured but an event that is in progress or occuring. Zacharias is pointing to God working even now as he speaks to care for His people. Now I want to remind you that God has been silent in regard to the nation of Israel for about 500 years. No one has heard from God and there has been no prophecy for 500 years. The nation has been longing for God's redemption and seeking Him in delivering them from the oppression of the Roman government. This is the time we find Zacharias in. He is the first person who is recorded in Scripture to hear from God. And here he is now being able to speak he is focusing on the fact that God is visiting them. It is not passed tense meaning he visited Zacharias in the temple and now He is gone, it is a visitation which is occuring as he spoke and there is no definitive end to the visitation. It has begun with the temple visit it will continue with the incarnation of Jesus Christ and the visitation is still continuing today in the fact that people are still being saved and it will end when Jesus calls us home.

This visitation that Zacharias is pointing to has everything to do with humility. Jesus is the example for humility and this humility is expressed in Jesus' birth and the reason for His birth. Zacharias points to the One who God is sending to be given power. In verse 69 Zacharias says, "And has raised up a horn of salvation for us." The idea behind saying our Savior is a horn is an ancient phrase that points to power. God is raising up One with the power to save. He comes in a regal line as a fulfillment of God’s promise from of old for the purpose of bringing deliverance to His people from their enemies. When you look at the wording here the first thing that comes to mind is power, might, and supremacy, not humility. So how is this an expression of Jesus' humility when Zacharias is clearly pointing to God's power, might and supremacy coming in and through the Messiah.

The humility of Jesus Christ is in the fact that in order for Him to have the power over sin and to deliver mankind from sin and to be the true servant of God and accomplish the redemption the buying back of all mankind to God has everything to do with what Jesus had to give up and take on.

This is the true heart of humility especially at Christmas time. We need to wrap our minds and hearts around this very solid truth. Christmas is not about us, Christmas is not about giving one another gifts. You want to get to the heart of Christmas you need to focus on this absolute, Christmas is about the Second person of the trinity who is God who was there at creation who creation was created for and through and who all creation will bow the knee to stepped down from His throne and came to take on the form of His own creation just so He Himself could buy His sinful creation back to Himself. No other religion teaches this no other god does this, it is only the true and living God who has done this. He has visited mankind in the form of man. That is humility. Philippians 2 teaches this fact.

Philippians 2:3–11 NASB95

3 Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; 4 do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. 5 Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

This is what true humility looks like. Jesus looked at His own creation from the beginning of time and He put our interests before His own. This is the humility that Jesus possess and the humility we must conform too. There is more to being like Christ then just being an imitator we need to be conformed taking on His character and His righteousness. An imitator doesn't go as far as being the exact representation of the person. I think of an imitator as someone who puts on an act, on the outside he looks like the genuine article sounds like the genuine article but strip away the outside and what do you find, the stale old sinful person you always have been. True humility puts that a side and puts yourself a side because it is not about you and puts on the person and work of Jesus Christ, which means you take on His righteousness and His personhood. Pride puts ourselves first and puts Christ to the side. Look at what Jesus did for us He is the example and more then that He is the One who's character we need to take on. Not only this Christmas season but everyday of our lives.

Jesus has visited mankind to selflessly redeem mankind back to Himself, His coming into this world for the purpose of redeeming us was the greatest example of Humility and that includes His life and His death as well.

There is a humble visitation next we will see there is also a humble preparation.

Humble Preparation

So we have seen Zacharias through the work of the Holy Spirit who is moving him and speaking through him has acknowledged the visitation of God in the humility of Christ and through Jesus' humility He not only is born of a virgin and born under the law but He will also be exalted above everything and everyone in power when He dies in our place and is raised from the dead and seated at God's right hand for all eternity. Now that we have been given the example of Humility Zacharias moves us to Humble Preparation.

Let's look at verse 72-76, Zacharias' song continues, "To show mercy toward our fathers, And to remember His holy covenant, 73 the oath which He swore to Abraham our father, 74 To grant us that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies, Might serve Him without fear, 75 In holiness and righteousness before Him all our days. 76 And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go on BEFORE THE LORD TO PREPARE HIS WAYS."

Here is something we need to examine. This character quality of humility that Jesus has so perfectly and beautifully expressed to us when He emptied Himself and took on the form of His own creation is not a new characteristic of the Godhead. It has always been there. We see this character of God in His mercy and in His promises and in fulfilling His promises. I have challenged you in the past and I will challenge you today look at other religions and examine their gods and see how many of their gods are merciful and humble. You won't find them. Zacharias as he is pointing to the passed and God's work of mercy we see this character of a humble God. Look God has all the right in the Garden when Adam and Eve sinned to have whipped them off the face of the earth and start again. No instead of doing this He not only let's them live, He provides for them a sacrifice to cover up their sin. Of course that sacrifice was only a foreshadow of who was to come it was only a covering. God in His mercy humbly prepared them for a the coming of the Messiah. God tells them in Genesis 3:15, "And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel," Here is God's merciful promise of a redeemer who will come in the flesh. This is mercy and this is humility because as we just saw with Philippians God who is sovereign who is in control of all things who is eternal who has the power to create from just His voice, has thought of His own creation and put them on the top of the list. He could have done away with mankind and started over but instead He prepared a way for them to be redeemed back to Him.

God made this first promise in Genesis and as Scripture continues He fleshes out, 'so to speak' the promise. God makes an oath with Abraham in Genesis 15 that Abraham will be a mighty people and will inherit the land, and and it is reiterated in Genesis 22 which we find here.

Genesis 22:15–19 NASB95

15 Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven, 16 and said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies. 18 “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.” 19 So Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham lived at Beersheba.

Man doesn't deserve a thing but God by His mercy has prepared all things for Abraham and God holds fast to His own promise. These are acts of mercy from a God who is all powerful yet always seeks the good of those who love Him and fear Him. The patriarchs Zacharias is pointing to here in his song have humbly come before a God who provides great things for these people who don't deserve it, that is mercy. That is also because God prepares the hearts of man to be humble before Him. He does this by His mercy and He does this by fulfilling His own promise to all mankind. He rescues man from their enemies, he prepares the way for man to see the need for a Savior and to see the grace and mercy in the humility of the One who lies in a manger who's path is to be hung on a cross. He is the One who prepares the hearts of man to be humble so that we can be called and separated to Him from the world and be made holy and righteous. God prepares us for humility by showing us how much control He has through showing us how much our of control we are in. His promises can't be broken and I am so grateful for that truth. His character never changes. Do you realize that Jesus was always prepared to go to the cross?

Think about this. God is see all things, He is omniscient and omnipotent. He knows all things and He sees all things, look you can't surprise God. There is nothing you can do that will shock Him, He knows what you are going to do at 2 this afternoon and he knew that before He even spoke the earth into existence. So when Adam and Eve disobeyed a direct command from God, and God provided the redemption plan in the garden in Genesis 3:15, Jesus, the preincarnate Christ, already knew when and how the redemption would take place. He was prepared for it already and in knowing what He would have to do He was humbly prepared. For Him to say the seed of the serpent would bruise the seed of the woman on the heel and the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent means Jesus was already prepared to empty Himself for our good and the Father's glory. Those whom God selected to carry out His prophecies and were all humbly prepared. And mankind needs to be humbly prepared as well.

This is ironic because even Zacharias had to be humbly prepared and now through this Zacharias' son John will also be humbly prepared and he will humbly prepare the hearts of mankind in the acceptance of the Messiah. Verse 76, "And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High," this is directed to his own son not to Jesus.

I can kind of picture this Zacharias hold his son in his arms, in the most humble of states. A dependent baby boy. Not even able to feed himself or cloth himself. He is the forerunner to the Messiah the one whom Jesus says is the greatest of men.

Matthew 11:10–11 NASB95

10 “This is the one about whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send My messenger ahead of You, Who will prepare Your way before You.’ 11 “Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist! Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

Zacharias' song is now directed to this infant in his arms who Zacharias knows will do wonderful things and prepare the way for the Messiah and the way he will prepare for the Messiah as by calling people to prepare their own hearts by turning from their wicked ways and humbly coming before the all powerful and mighty God who is the only One who can rescue them from their true enemy which is sin. This is because man's heart needs to be prepared because man's heart as we have seen is deceptively wicked it is sick and because of it's wickedness man thinks he can do anything on their own including being good enough to get into heaven. So hearts need to be humbly prepared.

We need to be humbly prepared for Christ, we need to humbly prepare for to celebrate His coming into this world the first time and we also need to be humbly prepared to celebrate His coming to the world at His second coming too.

Which brings me to the outcome of a humble example, and humble preparation, and that is humble submission.

Humble Submission

In verses 77-79 Zacharias continues, "To give to His people the knowledge of salvation By the forgiveness of their sins, Because of the tender mercy of our God, With which the Sunrise from on high will visit us, 79 TO SHINE UPON THOSE WHO SIT IN DARKNESS AND THE SHADOW OF DEATH, To guide our feet into the way of peace."

Here we have the culmination, in verse 77 we see the humble preparation of our hearts for the forgiveness of sin, in verse 78 we see the humble example of Jesus once again with Zacharias mentioning mercy expressed by the "Sunrise from on high will visit us." Then we get to the outcome.

The outcome is through Jesus' humility mankind will have the light of Christ shine on them and take us out of darkness and out of the shadow of death, this is what we will be rescued from and He is who we will be rescued to. This should drive us to our knees not only at the Christmas season but each and every day in humble submission to Him as our Savior. He is the One who by the power of the Holy Spirit guides us into the way of peace and this way of peace is not man made it is not something we can conceive in our minds to accomplish because we are sinful and our hearts only deceive us into following after the ways of this world which only lead anxiety and frustration. The only way we can be guided into the way of peace is if we are tapped into the One who has humbled Himself to the point of death even death on a cross. Jesus is the example, in seeing Him as the example, in trusting Him as the example our hearts our prepared to follow, and when we humble ourselves before God in Christ then we walk the path of peace. This is humble submission. This means that we don't chose our own way but we allow the Spirit of God to move our feet in His way.

Paul says this to the Colossian church about our walk look at this with me in Colossians 1:9-14;

Colossians 1:9–14 NASB95

9 For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 10 so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; 11 strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light. 13 For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Paul prays for the church at Colossae, to be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.' Every pastor should pray this for every church. This is a humble prayer by Paul because Paul is praying for the only thing that matters in life, it isn't riches it isn't power, it isn't about having the most recognition within the world as a world leader. It is to be discerning in this life in a godly way. He continues and points out the purpose of his prayer for them in verse 10. 'So that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us,' Let me pause there for just a second. He has qualified us, meaning He did it not us there is no room for pride we don't have the bragging rights to say look at me I am worthy, because we are not. 'He has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light.' The Light being Jesus Christ, who Zacharias calls "the Sunrise" in verse 78 and Zacharias continues in verse 79 to say "To shine upon those who sit in Darkness and the shadow of death. Jesus is the Light and He is the One who shines on us He is the One who in a darkened world has lit the path for us so we can see the pitfalls and the dangers and the hardships that come from Satan's temptations. He illumines our path. Which is exactly what Paul says in verses 13-14, For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." We need to first come to God trusting in Jesus' example when He gave up His place in heaven to come to this earth to die to pay the penalty for our sins. Jesus was prepared to do this from the foundation of the earth, and He humbly submitted to this plan. Humility is about looking at God's interests and seeing them as more important then your own. Humility is following after God call in your life. Humility is following after Jesus' example. Humility is about the heart being ready to follow Jesus into His kingdom. Humility is about following Jesus now as though your are already in the kingdom. Who is in control of your life if it is God how are letting go to His control. If it is you what is stopping you from letting go to God's control. Seek Him in humility before He humbles you because as Zacharias learned the hard way being humble is much better then being humbled.

The world has a saying, 'think of others during the holiday season' there is another, 'put others first.' Well those are nice little saying but if you are not putting God first and seeking Christ first then all of the putting others first is in vain. Humility starts with Christ and it ends with Christ and we need to put Christ first, at Christmas and everyday of our lives.