Sermon Tone Analysis

Steadfast Love

WELCOME

Good morning family.

Psalm 145:13b-14—The Lord is faithful in all His words and kind in all His works.

The Lord upholds all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down.

Have you been faithless?

Do you feel like you’re falling down?

Have you already fallen?

Does your soul feel bowed down, doubled-over on the floor?

Good news!

We’re not here because we’re faithful, but because He is.

God loves helping falling, bowed down, broken-down people.

In just a moment we’ll hear a reading from the text for today’s sermon in Matthew 2:13.

Turn there now.

While you’re turning, 3 quick announcements:

1) A word about PBC.

We are Disciples.

A disciple is a follower of Jesus

If there’s one thing followers of Jesus can’t get enough of, it’s encouragement

Hebrews 10:25 says gatherings like this help us encourage one another!

2) Q&A with elder candidate Bubba Jones, tonight at 5:30

3) Special Members Meeting—9/26 at 5:30

Voting on Chuck Quilhot as deacon of finance, Bubba Jones as elder, new constitution

Members Meeting packets with info about each item at the blue flag

Now look in your Bibles at Matthew 2:13 as my favorite PBC member comes to read for us.

Scripture Reading (Matthew 2:13-23), Holly Boutot

Prayer of Praise (God is relational)

Awesome is the Lord Most High

Praise to the Lord the Almighty

Prayer of Confession (Divisiveness), Chris Berlin

Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus

New City Catechism #38

Pastoral Prayer (John Rogers)

SERMON

On December 18, 2015 the force awakened.

After a decade of Star Wars silence, the first installment of a new trilogy of films opened in the United States.

The Force Awakens was a smashing success

It became the highest grossing film of 2015, even though it released only a week before Christmas

It eventually became the fourth-highest grossing film of all time, earning well over $2 billion at the worldwide box office

Both critics and fans loved it

It was certified fresh by Rotten Tomatoes and today remains the second-highest ranked movie in the Star Wars franchise, behind only The Empire Strikes Back

What made The Force Awakens so successful?

There’s a number of reasons we could list.

For example the film didn’t have anybody named Jar Jar Binks.

But perhaps the most important reason was that the film was new but not unique.

If you were new to the Star Wars universe (as my children were when they watched it) you found a fast-paced space adventure that was fun to watch and easy to follow.

You didn’t have to be a Star Wars nerd to find something in the movie to love.

But if you were a long-time Star Wars fan, the story had a richness and a depth that was inescapable.

The plot, the characters, the dialogue, even some of the action sequences had unmistakable callbacks to earlier films.

It was new, but not unique.

It was a new story that connected to an old story in an attempt to complete it.[1]

A similar thing is happening in the Gospel of Matthew.

The Apostle Matthew wants us to see the story of Jesus as new but not entirely unique.

It’s a new story that connects to an old story and completes it.

Turn to Matthew 2

Just after the visit from the magi, we see a young family forced to become refugees as they flee a bloodthirsty king

Three scenes in this story

And in them we see...

THREE WAYS Jesus connects to and completes the Old Testament story

1) Jesus Inaugurates a New & Better Exodus

1500 years before our story in Bethlehem, the Bible tells of another bloodthirsty king.

Like Herod, he was paranoid that the Jewish people were threatening his power

Like Herod, he concocted a bloodthirsty plan to keep his throne

Like Herod, the plan involved slaughtering baby boys

And just like in today’s story, God intervened to save the life of one baby boy

That baby boy, named Moses, would eventually deliver God’s people out of slavery in Egypt

Matthew believes that exodus was actually pointing to a new and better exodus, inaugurated by Jesus Himself...

2:13-15a—Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the Child, to destroy Him.” 14 And he rose and took the Child and His mother by night and departed to Egypt 15 and remained there until the death of Herod.

Just like Moses was a fugitive from Pharaoh, Jesus is a fugitive from Herod.

But Matthew has more in mind here than a few parallels between Moses and Jesus’ birth stories.

Matthew wants to show us that Jesus has come to do something like what Moses did.

Only better.

This is a new story that connects to an old story and completes it.

2:15b—This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my Son.”

Is there a prophecy that God would deliver His Son, Jesus, out of Egypt?

Not exactly.

Hosea 11:1—When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.

In context, it’s clear that Hosea is writing about Israel’s exodus from bondage in Egypt.

So what is Matthew doing?

The key is in the word “fulfill”

Major word in Matthew, used three times in today’s text and sixteen times in the gospel, more than any other gospel writer

One major Matthew scholar argues that “fulfillment” is the theme of the entire gospel [2]

Patrick Schreiner—“‘Fulfill’ has a variety of meanings, and in different contexts certain aspects might be highlighted.

Yet largely, we can say that it means that Jesus fills up Jewish history.... all things are brought to fruition in and through Jesus.”

[3]

Think of it like this.

Imagine you’re one of those coffee drinkers that take your coffee with flavored cream.

Your mug is about half full with coffee.

But your coffee isn’t complete.

Not only is the mug not full, but the drink isn’t yet what it’s meant to be.

It’s a shadow of what it’s supposed to be.

Then you add the cream.

Not only do you fill up your mug, but you enhance its contents.

Adding the cream doesn’t utterly transform the coffee.

It doesn’t change it to tea or Kool-Aid.

But it does change it to a degree.

In your mind, it enhances the coffee by making it what it was always meant to be in the first place.

Your coffee has been fulfilled by the flavored cream.

Not a perfect illustration (after all, we are talking about adding flavored creamer to your coffee) but it does help.

Jesus fulfills OT prophecy the same way that creamer fulfills your coffee.

He completes it, and enhances it.