Christmas is About the Advent of God's Love
Notes
Transcript
Handout
9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.
We have a hard time talking about LOVE in our culture.
We use the word love kind of like how we use the junk drawer in our house.
We love God
We love our Spouces...
We love our families...
But we also LOVE tacos…
You see the dilema?
We treat love as if it is some hidden treasure that we have to find…
Here’s the reality…we have a weak view of love...
There is a reason why the Bible says “God is Love”
That’s because love…real love…is powerful.
“There is no safe investment [of love]. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.
The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and anxieties of love is Hell.”
And it’s true isnt it…we say it like the one hit wonder band of the 1970’s said it... Love Hurts…EWWWWW Love Hurts...
Christmas Reveals Who God Loves
Christmas Reveals Who God Loves
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”
Another way to translate this word is “in our midst.”
God manifesting or revealing his love in our midst means that he doesnt just love us from a safe distance…it’s easy to “love” somone from a distance isnt it?
But the way that God loved was a love that came too close for comfort...
He entered into our world...
The $2 Theological Term for this is INCARNATION
It’s the same word we use for meat eating animals…we call them...Carnivores
Carnivores eat meat...
INCARNATION literally means that God became meat…he became flesh...
This is what John means when he writes in his gospel in John 1:14
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
The picture that I get when I think of God becoming flesh…or God dwelling among us is the picture of Christmas Dinner...
At Christmas dinner there are two tables: The Grown Up Table & The Kids Table...
In order to sit at the grown up table there are some rules:
You gotta be able to chew with your mouth closed.
You gotta be able to hold a grown up conversation.
You cant fight with your brother or sister...
In other words…in order to sit at the grown ups table you gotta have reached a certain level of maturity…
THERE ARE CONDITIONS ON SITTING AT THE GROWN UP TABLE...
But there are no conditions for the kids table...
You can pretty much do whatever you want at the kids table...
You can scream
You can fight
You can yell
You can chew with your mouth open
You can throw your food
WHEN I THINK OF GOD BECOMING INCARNATE I THINK OF HIM COMING AND SITTING DOWN AT THE KIDS TABLE...
It means that God reveals his love to us on our level
God revealing his love in our midst means that his love is unconditional...
He didnt require that we clean up our act before he revealed his love.
He didnt require for us to produce any amounts of good works before he revealed his love.
He freely, out of the overflow of his passion for his people…got right down on our level and demonstrated his love to us...
God’s love isn’t fictional
God’s love isn’t hidden.
God’s love isn’t hard to find.
God’s love isn’t abstract.
God’s love isn’t ethereal.
Instead, Since God revealed his love to us it means:
His love is obvious.
His love is easy to find.
His love is tangible.
His love is real.
Very simply…GOD REVEALING HIS LOVE “AMOUNG US” means that God WANTS us to experience His love...
“DO YOU FEEL LIKE GOD LOVES YOU THIS MORNING?”
I didnt ask do you “think” God loves you...
I asked you if you FEEL loved by God...
Paul prayed for the church in Thessolonica...
5 May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ.
His prayer wasnt that they would just know God’s love…but that they would be ushered into the presence of God’s love…the felt love of God...
My prayer for this Christmas season and over the course of 2021 is that we, as a church, would experience the blessing of the FELT love of God. That we wouldnt just express a belief in God’s love…but deep in our bones…we would feel the warmth of His love 24 hours a day…7 days a week.
Christmas reminds us WHO God loves…that he loves you and me…undeserving as we might be…sinful as we are…nonetheless, God loves us...
Christmas Reveals How God Loves
Christmas Reveals How God Loves
The Holy Spirit through the Apostle John doesn’t just tell us that he loves us...
He doesnt just say that he manifests his love to us…and that’s that...
Rather…John says
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”
In other words…we can experience the felt love of God when when first remember how God displayed his love to us...
And how does John tell us that God put his love on display?
…that God sent his only Son into the world...
The way that we can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God loves us is in this one essential truth…that God sent Jesus into the world…it’s Christmas
In fact every time we find how God loves mention in the Bible there is a common theme…listen:
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
1 Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,
God loves by giving…and in Christ he gave us the greatest gift possible.
This is why we give gifts at Christmas…it isnt because we just love to give gifts…it’s because at Christmas God gave us the greatest gift of all…His Son…and when we give give gifts we are doing it to remind ourselves that Christmas is about the greatest gift…Jesus Christ
So if you need convincing this morning that God loves you…you only need to remember Christmas…In God sending Jesus as his gift of love…and in it he showed us who he loved, he showed us how he loved…and he show us why He loves.
Christmas Reveals Why God Loves
Christmas Reveals Why God Loves
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him.”
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him.”
The reason that God revealed his love to us in Jesus Christ is for this reason… “so that we might live through him...”
God gave us the gift of His Son on Christmas morning because he wanted us to live.
There’s an implication here that we might miss if we arent careful...
If John says that it is through the gift of Jesus that we “might” live…the implication is that we aren’t yet alive if we havent received the gift of God’s love in Jesus Christ.
And this is exactly what the Bible teaches...
That apart from Christ, we are dead in our trespasses in sin.
This doesnt mean that we are physically dead…it means that we are spiritually dead...
We are seperated from God in our sin.
Slaves to the passions of our flesh and desire of our eyes...
And this is why John says here in this letter that God sent Jesus into the World…so that through him we might live...
Because it is only through Jesus Christ that we can become spiritually alive.
Look at the very next verse…
10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Jesus was our propitiation--
It’s a big word that just means that Jesus was our sacrifice.
It was through Jesus’ sacrifice that Jesus was hurt so that we could be healed.
It was through his sacrifice that Jesus died so that we could live.
It was through his sacrifice that Jesus was forsaken…so that we could experience the Love of God...
The Reason why Christmas really is Merry…is because it is through Christmas that we can experience the love of God this morning...
I pray that this morning, you will receive the unconditional, all consuming, love that God has for you…
So here it is again…
9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.
Merry Christmas