Sermon Tone Analysis

“So, what do you want for Christmas?”

It’s a common question.

As a kid, I was always at the ready with an answer.

I had something in mind, you could count on it: Legos, baseball cards, Ninja Turtles, a bike, a scooter, etc.

Now when someone asks me I usually say, “Oh, I don’t need or want anything; I have all I could ever wish for.”

People don’t generally like that answer.

My beautiful, long-suffering wife gave up long ago asking me what I want.

She got tired of the shoulder shrug, I’m sure.

It was probably six years ago when I got the phone call from my parents.

“So, what do you want for Christmas?”

I gave them my standard response, “Nothing, thank you.

I don’t need a thing.”

I mean, honestly.

At that point I was pushing 30; I had the means to buy anything I wanted without having to wait for Christmas.

That, of course, didn’t sit too well with Mom or Dad.

“We have to get you something.

What do you want?”

“Let’s just not exchange presents this year,” I suggested.

“Now, Barrett…give me some ideas,” my mom insisted.

At long last, it dawned on me, something I truly wanted.

So I presented my request to my then 55-year-old mother and 61-year-old father: “I know what I want: a baby brother!”

I thought Mom was going to have a heart attack.

I’m pretty sure she dropped the phone.

She might still be laughing, all these years later.

“So, what do you want for Christmas?”

This question has been posed to our kids a few dozen times over the course of the last several weeks.

When Patience’s piano teacher asked her what she wanted, Patience told her, and then politely asked Ms. Carla what she wanted for Christmas.

To this question, Carla paused for a moment and then said, “World peace.”

It’s the beauty pageant answer; we hear it so often it’s become a cliche.

[Play Video Clip]

>World Peace.

The truth is we all want peace, we all desire peace.

No one wants chaos and discord, struggles and difficulty.

Peace in all areas of life would be welcome by anyone.

Peace, according to the Bible, is defined very broadly; here’s my best stab at summing it up: peace is “relational, physical, spiritual wholeness, well-being, and security.”

That’s peace.

And it’s this the angel came to announce to a group of smelly, unimportant, lowly shepherds.

This, the angel came to announce with the heavenly host—a great company of angels, a choir of thousands—came singing:

>If you have your Bible (and I hope you do), please turn with me to the Gospel of Luke.

If you are able and willing, please stand with me for the reading of God’s Holy Word:

May the Lord add His blessing to the reading of His Holy Word!

>Can you wrap your head around what happened in the hearts and minds of the shepherds that evening?

There they are, a handful of regular fellows, just doing their job, minding their business (and the business of the sheep under their care), and then, out of nowhere, an angel of the Lord, surrounded by the glory of the Lord, shows up.

We know, because Luke includes the detail, that they were terrified; you’d be terrified, too.

And then, what they hear from the angel is absolutely incredible.

It’s stunning.

A baby’s been born.

Without further information, this isn’t really news, at least not news these shepherds would need to know.

But that a baby was born who is the Savior, the Messiah, the Lord—that’s news, for sure.

The first angel gives the shepherds (and us) the facts about who Jesus is.

He tells us Jesus’ job: Savior—the One who would save His people from their sins;

Jesus’ title: the Messiah—God’s King promised to His people, promises recorded for us in the Old Testament;

and Jesus’ identity: the Lord­—this is the word used by Greek-speaking Jews to translate the Hebrew Yahweh, the personal name of God by which He introduced Himself to His people for centuries.

The first angel comments on the facts of the situation.

The rest of the heavenly host joins in with the color commentary—the flourish, the pomp and circumstance.

A baby’s birth is typically greeted with joy and excitement, but on this first Christmas, because of whose birth it is, the joy and excitement is unmatched by any other birth in history.

The very heavens open up and let forth praise.

The angels’ song is meant to help us realize that what’s going on is beyond significant: this baby’s birth is far and away the most historically important and meaningful birth ever.

The angel and his traveling acapella group take to the sky as their stage; angels, more numerous than the stars, sing melody and harmony and cover the rhythm, filling the night air with worship.

Glory should be obvious.

God deserves glory: “Glory to God in the highest heaven,” they sing.

What the great company of the heavenly host announce as the shepherds’ great benefit, what they announce as our great and matchless benefit, is peace—peace to those on whom [God’s] favor rests.

Peace Announced

The shepherds, lowly as they were, certainly grasped the concept of peace.

They were living during a time of “great, worldwide peace,” or so it was called.

Augustus—the same who had ordered the census—had established what was known as the Pax Romana, an empire at peace, guaranteeing safety (unless you happened to be a slave or a rebel).

The Pax Romana was also known as ‘The Imperial Peace’, though historians tell us ‘peace’ is not what one finds in the pages of history.

The shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night were, this night, going to meet the One who would soon instruct Augustus (and everyone else) about what peace really was.

The so-called peace in Rome was about to be dwarfed by the peace of God, brought to earth by a baby.

Epictetus, a first-century philosopher, rightly observed:

“While the emperor may give peace from war on land and sea, he is unable to give peace from grief and envy; he cannot give peace of heart, for which man yearns far more than even outward peace.”

No emperor could give what this baby would.

Here with the arrival of this baby, sing the angels, is the coming of a peace that goes down deep, peace from your head to your toes, peace that lasts beyond the grave.

On earth peace…is the great and matchless announcement of the angels to the shepherds.

The announcement of peace is truly incredibly, stunning news.

It’s the announcement, not of perfect harmony between men.

It’s not the announcement of cessation from war.

It’s not the announcement that hostility amongst men has come to an end.

It’s much, much better news than that.

The angelic announcement of peace is one of peace between God and man.

It’s the healing of the estrangement caused by human sinfulness, the availability of a relationship, a harmonious relationship with God.

On earth peace the song goes on.

J. C. Ryle: “Now is come to earth the peace of God which passes all understanding—the perfect peace between a Holy God and sinful man; peace, which Christ was to purchase with His own blood; peace which is offered freely to all mankind; peace which, once admitted into the heart, makes man live at peace with one another and will one day overspread the whole world.”

Peace which passes all understanding...

Peace with God was a dream, a faint, glimmering hope.

It seemed impossible and improbable in that day to be at peace with God.

There were so many rules and regulations, sacrifices and statutes.

It was, at best, a temporary feeling—to be at peace.

For the shortest of moments, perhaps after making atonement for your sins, possibly on the Day of Atonement and for a few days following, you might have the feeling of peace with God.

But then you’d blow it.

You’d mess up.

You’d break a Sabbath law or become ceremonially unclean.

And that sense of peace you had with God was gone, a mere memory.

Peace with God is the announcement.

On earth peace to those on whom His favor rests.

When a person has been reconciled to God and enjoys inner tranquility in their own minds—that’s this peace.

This is what the child in the manger brings.

Real, lasting peace.

Peace with God through a right relationship bought, not with our obedience and piety, but purchased by this child who came to save us, to rob our sin and make us holy at the expense of His life.

The announcement is peace by way of substitution.