Christmas-God's Gift to the World
Christmas – God’s Gift to the World
12/25/2004 and 12/2/2005
Introduction
This is a great time of year. It has always been one of my favorites. The world over they are celebrating the coming of Jesus-born in a manger as a baby.
There are lots of traditions and I think they are great. I celebrate them even if it is a fact that some of them were adapted over time and not based on the truth. They are more a cultural thing than anything but that is great.
Traditions of Christmas
Some people are really negative about the traditions because of the pagan roots but if we used that as a rule we couldn’t have any holidays. Our entire calendar is based on pagan roots…Thursday after Thor, Sunday after sun worship and so on.
Let’s redeem the holiday. Here is a sample of some good traditions; redeemed traditions.
READ EXAMPLES
-Of course we know what it is really about.
Galatians 4 NLT
4/ But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. 5 God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children.* [1] /
Luke 2 NLT
At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. 2 (This was the first census taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3 All returned to their own towns to register for this census. 4 And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David’s ancient home. He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee. 5 He took with him Mary, his fiancée, who was obviously pregnant by this time.
6/ And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. 7 She gave birth to her first child, a son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the village inn.[2] 8 That night some shepherds were in the fields outside the village, guarding their flocks of sheep. 9 Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. They were terribly frightened, 10 but the angel reassured them. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I bring you good news of great joy for everyone! 11 The Savior—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born tonight in /Bethlehem, the city of David! 12 And this is how you will recognize him: You will find a baby lying in a manger, wrapped snugly in strips of cloth!”
13 Suddenly, the angel was joined by a vast host of others—the armies of heaven—praising God:
14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and peace on earth to all whom God favors.*”
15 When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, “Come on, let’s go to Bethlehem! Let’s see this wonderful thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”
16 They ran to the village and found Mary and Joseph. And there was the baby, lying in the manger.
/[3]/
-We know the story. Jesus came then grew up and died for the sins of the world.
-There had been 400 years of silence and the people were wondering about God’s attitude towards them.
-Jesus came as the answer to how God feels about mankind….He loves us.
-This is a short article the paper asked me to write.
The Cradle that Rocked the World
By Pastor Terry Roberts
Faith Christian Family Church
How could they know? The shepherds, wise men, and onlookers who beheld the baby that night knew that He was special but they didn’t know how special.
How could they know He was God’s answer for the sins of all mankind? How could they know that He was the fulfillment of thousands of years of prophecy and preparation? How could so much ride on the birth, life and death of one human?
He was unique. He was born of a virgin. That made Him qualified like no one else in the universe to take the sin and punishment of mankind. The scroll of mankind’s fate was sealed and no one was found in all of the universe who was able to unseal the scroll except the sinless Son of God.
This truly was a special baby. His arrival on the earth signaled the potential end to the curse of sin and death. His birth was a message to us that He had not given up on us. He was born as the fulfillment of God’s promise to Adam and Eve back in the garden that the seed of a woman would be born to crush the head of the enemy.
Here was God’s answer to humankind’s problem coming in the form of an innocent newborn. Christmas is special because it is God telling us and reminding us of how much He loves us. We celebrate the baby born in the cradle that rocked the world.
John 3 NLT
16/ “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. 17 God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it.[4] /
-For months I have had it in my heart that we are to take an offering for missions to further the reason that the father sent Jesus into the world.
-He died for the world. He came for the world. He wants the world to be saved.
-Our entire offering is going to be given away. Everything that you put in the buckets goes to missions.
Altar call (give your life back to God)
Offering with instrumental music
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*
Galatians 4:5
Greek sons; also in 4:6.
[1]Holy Bible : New Living Translation. 1997 (Ga 4:3). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House.
[2]Holy Bible : New Living Translation. 1997 (Lk 2:1). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House.
*
Luke 2:14
Or and peace on earth for all those pleasing God. Some manuscripts read and peace on earth, goodwill among people.
[3]Holy Bible : New Living Translation. 1997 (Lk 2:7). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House.
[4]Holy Bible : New Living Translation. 1997 (Jn 3:15). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House.