dec 24

Matthew 1:18–25 NASB95

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. “She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.” Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which translated means, “God with us.” And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus.

Open with Matthew.

This is the time of year where we reflect on the goodness that we see around us. We reflect the love of good family and look forward to visiting and seeing our loved ones. And it is a time of year where we reflect on the Fathers greatest gift, his only son.

So it is a time of year that I truly love but it is also a time of year that is like nails on a chalk board to me. You do not have to look far to realize that most people really do not have Jesus on their mind during this time.

Really, it is a cave in 2 a secular way of thinking and Jesus is the afterthought thrown in to curb our own guilt. We cannot explain the consumerism and the materialism that we see unless this is in fact taking place.

I feel that there are so many things in our culture that distract us from what we would call the true meaning of Christmas. This has become so traditional and so routine in American culture That we skip on pass everything because we hear it so often this time of year.

Beyond that I think there is too much confusion out there, and this year in particular feels like there is much hostility towards what we would call the traditional meaning of Christmas. I think as a church we have sensed hostility for awhile now, And I mean Christians across the United States when I say the church, but this year seems to be extra hostile.

The hostility that we faced in the recent past was not really that bad and to be honest what I'm seeing this year is still not that bad. We still have the right and the ability to proclaim the gospel and as long as we have that right things are not so bad.

The average Christian in the American culture tends to be a bit more fatalistic than what they should be. So they say things like we can't say Merry Christmas anymore. Yes we can, and we should never have a defeated attitude as if we can't.

But saying Merry Christmas is not the gospel therefore it is not bold to say Merry Christmas. It's pretty average to say Merry Christmas but bold is definitely not the description of saying Merry Christmas.

this year, I want us to focus on the importance of the incarnation. In Matthew chapter 1 is a wonderful place to begin. first of all verses one through 17 gives us the genealogy of Jesus. And the genealogy traces the line of Jesus from Abraham to Joseph.

Joseph being the adoptive and at the same time rightful father of Jesus we have the connection according to Jewish law then not only is Jesus a descendant of Abraham and the fulfillment of a promise given to Abraham but he is also the descendant of David.

And being connected to both Abraham and David is huge not only for the Hebrew people, what for the sake of the covenant that God gave long before the birth of Jesus.

So then we come to verse 18 and Matthew uses the phrase now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows. But that word birth is not your average word or typical word that you would use for somebody being born. It was not the common Greek phrase to describe Hey Henry was born this morning or the birth of Henry was On this date.

No, the exact phrase is the Genesis of Jesus Christ. Which means origin. The Origin of Jesus messiah. We cannot conclude that this is the beginning of God the Son but it is the beginning of God entering the realm of time, space, flesh and material.

So I do not like to use our English phrasing when describing the origins of God coming in flesh. I try to stop myself from saying the birth of Jesus. It is such a natural flow that it happens, but I always beat myself up for doing it.

The one thing you will never catch me saying is the birthday of Jesus. That gives me the chills. I cannot bring myself to describe this time of year as the birthday of the everlasting, eternal son of God.

If it is done properly than I can not argue, there is a reason why Jesus entered the way he did. It was not without purpose. But it was very much for the redemption of rebellious sinners waging war on the everlasting God. Rebellious sinners, such as all of us in here.

We are told that Mary was betrothed to Joseph. We think about it like an engagement but it was so much more serious than that. When you are betrothed, you are already considered married and it was so serious that even though the wedding has not taken place, if you wanted to end the betrothment you still had to do it by divorce.

Marrige was a very serious thing in Hebrew culture and in early christian culture because marriage is a very serious manner to God. He is serious about marriage but it is still a gift. So the text says before they came together, Mary was found to be with child.

Luke gives us a wider angle of this picture

Luke 1:26–35 NASB95

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the descendants of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God. “And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.” Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” The angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God.

Put yourself in mary’s shoes. She is engaged, going through the Hebrew process of betrothment, and suddenly and angel comes to you and explains, you have found favor with God. And though you are a virgin, you will have a child.

The Holy Spirit will overshadow you, and that language echos

Genesis 1:2 NASB95

The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

Literlly means that the Spirit of God was overshadowing the waters. Remember, Matthew, the genesis of Jesus.

So picture yourself hearing this for the first time. Learning that you will give birth to your king, knowing that you will give birth to your Lord, knowing that you will give birth to the one who will forgive you of all your sins.

Now put yourself in Josephs shoes. Excuse me, Mary is what? No doubt the man was hurt. Probably though he was betrayed. But the scriptures says that he was righteous and he did not want to bring shame to Mary so he decided to divorce her in secret.

But before he can go through with his plans, an angel reveled to Joseph, what Mary was going through. Ok, now again put yourself in Josephs shoes.

Oh, you mean Mary was telling the truth? Now think about this for a second. Joseph had his mind made up and was ready to divorce Mary, and suddenly he doesn’t. Clearly, in the realm of history, Joseph dramatically and instantly changed his mind. and clearly that took a persasion that was not only miraculas but also divine

the incarnation is that the core of the Christian message. All of scripture and all of history proclaim God active role in redeeming the world through his son Jesus Christ. Mankind is the recipient of this redemption for the glory of God alone.

Salvation is not for us to boast about ourselves , Salvation is not about us saying we're good Christians. Salvation is all the work of God by his divine plans. Mankind has rebelled against God not only in action but in their heart.

Every one of you who sits in here at one point was a rebel towards God. Paul says we were enemies to God and while we were enemies Christ came.

It is this moment that we are reading now that while we were enemies Christ came. The doctrine of the incarnation has to be reflected on in the Christian life. Because we're not talking about the creation of Jesus we're talking about God in flesh. The everlasting son came in flesh to rescue fallen flesh.

You see, the reason why every single person is rebellious towards God is because we are born with this rebellion. This rebellion is sin and this sin is within us because of the fall. We are desperately sick in our hearts, in our minds. and so when we think about redemption we need to think about being liberated from that sickness.

The perfection that is required by God can only come from God. But the demand of perfection in obedience is required from man. This is why we emphasize the two natures of Jesus. the God man who came.

because of his divine nature he is able to fulfill all righteousness which he has done on our behalf. Not that you can fulfill all righteousness because you cannot but that he did it for you because of his divine nature , because he is God.

But the requirement for this righteousness is not a debt that God owes it is a debt that mankind owes. So mankind needs a representative, mankind means a covenant leader. We need one like Moses who can liberate us and lead us through the Red Sea. We need a great general like Joshua.

As a matter of fact that's what the name of Jesus is, Joshua. We get our English saying of Jesus from the Greek pronunciation. But the Hebrew pronunciation is yeshua, they didn't have JS in Hebrew so when you are reading about Joshua in the Old Testament the Hebrew word is yeshua.

So here comes this greater Joshua here comes this one who is greater than Moses and he is able to fulfill all righteousness because he is truly God. But it doesn't end there, he is able to do it on behalf of all mankind because he is the head of the new covenant and he is truly man.

He knows what it's like to feel pain, to thirst, to love, to be tempted, to be tried, to be betrayed, to laugh , to work, to mourn, to grieve, to feel anger, to look at the ruins that is creation that was caused by Adam and no that this earth can be so much better had there been no sin to corrupt it.

This one comma this Messiah is now in the womb of a young woman who God looked on with favor. We celebrate the incarnation because there is no Salvation without it. We celebrate God's infinite wisdom that he made a way for himself to come in flesh and represent mankind for all who have faith in him.

Now in Christian circles we always say the Virgin birth but as far as we can tell there was nothing miraculous about the birth itself. the miracle is in the conception of this God man. So we should not call it the Virgin birth but we should call it the Virgin conception. Now there is something to be said about the titles that Jesus is given.

He is given the name of Jesus because he will save his people from their sins period the name Jesus itself has a meaning and that meaning is given to us here in Matthew. But that's not the only name we see that is given to him we also see he will be called Emmanuel.

And that is quoting from Isaiah Chapter 7. Now it is interesting because God through the Prophet Isaiah told ahaz that whatever sign he asks of God will do. And a has responded in a way that sounds nice but his intentions were not pure he said it is not good to test God.

He is right, we should not put God to the test like that but God gave him permission to request any sign. God already knew his answer and God already knew what sign he would give. So God said I will give you a sign, and the sign is this a Virgin shall be with child and bear a son.

And then God said through the Prophet Isaiah he will be called Emmanuel , God with us. He has intentions were not pure and the message that God was giving a has was this, I will be with you , I am there always , I am God with you And I will be with you. And what a has was doing was trying to find a non offensive way to say I don't want you.

And God already knew this and in a way the response is this, you don't want me guess what, I am still with you. And this is true of Jesus do you want Jesus? He is with us. You say you do not want Jesus guess what he's still with you.

For those of us who want Jesus, who seek him out in faith, who love our savior and adore the glorious work that he did , he is God with us as Lord and savior. For those who do not want Jesus and reject him and rebel against him he is God with them also and he is their Lord and judge.

That's what it was in the case of a house , he was still with him but not with the offer of savior, not anymore, he was with him as judge. God is with everyone for those in faith he is with them as savior for those without faith he is with them as judge and what a frightening thought.

There is no running from God, there is no hiding from God. Emmanuel God with us. And this first advent that we gather and celebrate was not to bring judgment but to bring Salvation.

Today is the day of Salvation, now is the time to reach out and respond in faith. Because the second advent Jesus is not coming as savior he is coming as judge. So we marveled at the grace of the infant Lord and savior. Who was helpless, defenseless, came into the world just like us.

Mary and Joseph got to hold him, love him, change his diapers, instruct him, be loved back by him as a child. we reflect back and we think about the gentleness of our savior at his 1st coming. Gentleness, peace , grace, mercy. Amazing Grace, amazing love, because we serve an amazing savior let's pray.