Sermon Tone Analysis

PART 1

Morning everyone.

We’re happy to have the kids with us today, but I understand that sitting around and listening to me talk for 45 minutes may be a bit of a challenge for them.

So we’re going to do things a little differently today.

We’re going to take periodic breaks during this message, to give everyone a chance to stand up and breathe, and to help us focus a little better.

The question is, why are the kids with us today?

They’re with us because this is our Christmas service, and Christmas is by definition a family holiday.

At the first Christmas, we see, essentially, the birth of a new family—a mom, a dad, and a baby—and with them, millions upon millions of brothers and sisters.

I’ll invite you to turn with me to Luke chapter 2. In we see the story of the birth of Christ.

But every time my dad would read us this story when I was a child, I always thought the beginning of this story was kind of boring.

I wanted to get to the good part, to the part where baby Jesus came—I wanted to skip to verse 6.

In fact, let’s do that: everyone start reading with me at , verse 6.

Joseph and Mary travel to Bethlehem...

6 And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth.

7 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.

That always stood out to me as a child, because I felt sad for that baby.

When Zadie was born a few months ago, we were in a comfortable hospital—the room was warm, her bed was soft.

We had soft pajamas for her, the room was quiet—everything about it was comfortable.

That was definitely not the case for Jesus.

As a child I felt bad for him because I knew a manger couldn’t have been a very comfortable bed.

It would have been, basically, a wooden box, probably filled with hay.

I spent a lot of my childhood around horses, and I’d sat on many bails of hay.

Hay is very uncomfortable (more comfortable than just the wooden box, but still).

Hay is itchy, and it scratches your skin, and it’s never even—there are always some spots that are harder than others.

And I knew the smell that must have been around there—animals stink.

I remember feeling bad for that baby, that the first things he smelt and felt were hay poking him in the back and in the head, and the smell of animals all around.

And that’s the first thing we need to remember.

Jesus’s birth did not take place in comfortable conditions—he was born into a relatively poor family (his dad was a carpenter, so he wouldn’t have been rich), in very poor conditions.

Why would God have wanted his Son to be born like that?

Because that’s the way he would live his whole life.

Jesus’s entire life was humble.

He did not think about himself, he thought about others.

He served other people—healing them, teaching them, showing them what it looks like to serve.

And he served his people until the end, when he reached this terrible death on the cross.

Jesus was God, but he never tried to get for himself what he deserved.

That’s the first reason we celebrate his birth—because even at the beginning, his birth showed us what his life would be like.

PART 2

I said before that we celebrate Jesus’s birth because it was a humble birth, like his life would be a humble life.

But the story of Jesus’s birth is way more incredible than that.

And in fact, the first part of the story—what I always thought was the “boring” part—show us why his birth was so incredible.

Let’s read starting at verse 1, and you’ll see what I mean.

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered.

2 This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be registered, each to his own town.

4 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, 5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered.

2 This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be registered, each to his own town.

4 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, 5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

6 And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth.

7 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.

That doesn’t sound like a very interesting beginning, but it’s actually incredible.

Anon, 2016.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version, Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles.