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We’re continuing our series on how the Apostles’ Creed summarizes important truths in scripture.
We’re not studying the creed, we’re studying the truths that the creed points to in the Bible.
When we recite the creed together, in just a moment, I’d like us to stand together and recite it, I know we’ve seen the video, but today let’s all participate.
When we recite these I believe statements, we’re boldly rejecting all other narratives, all other explanations for why the world is the way it is, and we’re saying, this is the why the world is the way it is.
We’re rejecting the world’s idea that everything happened by chance, and that there’s no meaning.
We’re saying there’s a reason why death happens, why there is sorrow in life, why there is brokenness all around.
And we are also saying why we have hope.
We’re saying there’s a solution, and we’re not it!
Let’s recite the creed together.
So why is the world the way it is?
It is because we’re living in the brokenness that came as a result of the fall into sin.
In the beginning, in the first two chapters of the Bible, &2, we read that God created everything, heaven and earth.
We’ve studied this truth already.
After God created something, we read, “and God saw that it was good.
He created light, it was good.
He created plants and trees, it was good.
He create animals, it was good.
He created human beings, it was very good.
But then there was sin.
Adam and Eve, the first two human beings God created, chose to disobey God.
He warned them what would happen if they disobeyed, but they believed the serpent, and plunged all of humanity into a path of sin.
They exchanged the glory of God, for sin.
But God demonstrated a key character trait in the beginning.
He is an initiator.
God initiates, he starts.
God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, exist in perfect loving harmony.
They lack for nothing, at all.
They perfectly honour, glorify and love one another, so perfectly that though they are three persons, they are one being.
It is out of the overflow of God’s goodness, love and power, that God created the universe.
God initiated it, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, in a perfectly timed, perfectly set dance—C.S. Lewis.
But notice what happened after Adam and Eve sinned.
God initiated the conversation.
God provided the first sacrifice, providing clothes from animal skins for Adam and Eve to cover their shame.
But God also promised to initiate a way, a final and total solution for sin.
He promised that one of Eve’s offspring would crush Satan and sin, forever.
So now we fast forward through history to Luke chapter 1. Do we still use the phrase fast forward?
I know that’s what we used in the days of VHS and cassette tapes.
Who has no idea what I’m talking about.
Is it skip now?
Okay, skip to Luke, but first we have God initiating and preparing for Jesus incarnation.
God initiated by telling Noah about the flood, and telling him to build an ark which saved believing Noah and his family.
God initiated and called Abram out of Ur.
God initiated and saved the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt.
God initiated by raising up judges, and then the kings.
And God initiated by sending his Son.
And here, in , we have the Trinity present, initiating, just as in creation, now present again, in a new creation: the means of salvation.
God the Father sends Gabriel, the messenger (angel), to the virgin Mary.
We have the Holy Spirit present, conceiving the Son, in Mary.
We won’t look at the Holy Spirit this morning, we’ll look at him later, when we profess our belief in God the Holy Spirit.
I suppose we could look at Mary, but we won’t do that either.
Take a moment to think about the Trinity.
God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Working together in perfect love, perfect harmony!
The Trinity is available to us all.
There is no one, nothing to stop the Trinity to connect with you.
Look at the Trinity in how God interacts here, in , initiating, just as in creation, now present again, in a new creation: the means of salvation.
God the Father sends Gabriel, the messenger (angel), to the virgin Mary.
The Holy Spirit conceives, the Son is present as the baby.
We need to connect ourselves to Genesis here.
John does just that in his gospel when he wrote, in the beginning.
This is a radical act of God.
Not radical on his part, but seemingly radical on our part!
God enters into this very broken, very sin-filled world.
He takes on the very nature of humanity.
He breaks into our self-focussed, self-help deluded attitude.
He says, no!
You can’t do it.
It is impossible.
Several times in the Old Testament, God tells the people, “Stop, just stop.
Stop your sacrifices.
Stop trying to work your way in, stop trying to buy your way in.
I don’t need your sacrifices.
I don’t need your lambs and bulls.
“Those things were supposed to be the outward expression of an inward reality.
They were supposed to show that your hearts were besotted with me.
That your whole focus in life was me.
But it isn’t.
You give of your gifts, in exchange for a blessing here, a sense of peace there.
You think you can get stuff in life by doing something.
Those things were supposed to be the outward expression of an inward reality.
They were supposed to show that your hearts were besotted with me.
That your whole focus in life was me.
But it isn’t.
You give of your gifts, in exchange for a blessing here, a sense of peace there.
You think you can get stuff in life by doing something.
“That’s not how it works.
I want your heart.
I want to hear you say, ‘You God are my heart, my life, my soul, my strength.
Even if I lost everything, all my money, all my family, all my treasures, my home, my very life, but could still have you, nothing else would matter.
In you I find my joy, my delight, my hope, my strength.’”
But it is impossible.
No matter how hard you try.
I dare you.
Try to be perfectly obedient to God.
You’ll fail before this day is over.
We cannot save ourselves.
It is impossible.
Our God is the God who overcomes the impossible.
Mary asked the angel.
“I get it, God wants me to give birth to his Son.
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