Sermon Video: Immanuel, "God with us" - Matthew 1:22-25

"God is with us", what does this mean?  When Isaiah declared that the virgin's child would be named Immanuel, it seemed most likely that God would be with his people in Spirit.  After all, God had gone to great lengths to convince his Covenant people that he was the only true God, that they need seek no other.  God could be "with" his people wherever they were.  And yet, more was needed, the Covenant people were unable to lift themselves up to the lofty standard of the Law of Moses, they needed help.  As Matthew recounts the story of Jesus, the term Immanuel takes on a whole new meaning.  Because Mary's conception was an act of the Holy Spirit, God himself would be entering into his creation in new way unlike anything that had happened before.  The God of the universe, not bound by time or space, would take upon himself human flesh and live as we do, bound by the laws that he himself had helped his father craft.  Immanuel would go from being a symbol of God's relationship with his people to being a literal truth; God would indeed be "with us" when the Christ was born.
How would this advent of Creator into his creation change our world?  One thing became crystal clear, if God is willing to condescend so much to save us, his love for us cannot be doubted.  Likewise, if God found it necessary to go to such an end to save humanity, our hope of ever fixing ourselves must have been false all along.  God came down to earth at Bethlehem because there was no other way, Immanuel was our only hope.
After his dream ends, Joseph proceeds to obey the word of God by bringing Mary home as his wife.  The Son of God will now have an adoptive father to raise him on behalf of his heavenly Father. 

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Sermon Video: Joseph and the angel - Matthew 1:18-21

Infidelity is a brutal emotional and spiritual wrecking ball, it destroys families and ruins lives.  Joseph, a young man pledged to be married to a local village girl named Mary was hit with the realization that his intended bride had been unfaithful before their marriage could even be consummated.  Mary didn't offer an excuse or explanation, but her guilt was all too obvious, she was pregnant.  God sent Mary an angel to let her know what was about to happen, but he did something interesting with Joseph, he allowed Joseph to react to this shocking news according to his own character before the angel came to explain the situation.  By doing so, God gave Joseph a chance to show that he was indeed a righteous man.
Joseph decided to divorce Mary quietly rather than demand public justice.  He chose to have mercy upon her, even though her apparent sin was against him, rather than taking his anger out on her to salve his pride.  It was an act of restraint that is an example to us all, Joseph may have had the right to humiliate Mary, but he didn't have the heart to do it.  Joseph couldnt' allow himself to be part of a lie by going through with the marriage, but he also didn't have a vindictive or self-righteous impulse.
After his decision, God sent an angel to let Joseph know what was really going on.  The child was from the Holy Spirit!  God had helped barren women before, it's one of the major themes of the Old Testament, but always through their husband.  Now, God has created life apart from the natural process.  Thus the child born to Mary will be part of David's royal line, if Joseph is willing to marry her, but not of David's fallen ancestry.  To top it off, the angel tells Joseph that the child's name will be Jesus, "because he will save his people from their sins".  Save them from their sins!  Not even the great Law-giver, Moses, had been able to overcome sin, the whole generation he led died in the desert before entering into the Promised Land.  And yet, this child, born of the Holy Spirit, will accomplish so much more than any who had before.

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Daniel prayed, "just as he had done before." Daniel 6:10

As Christians, should we be in conflict with our culture as part of our effort to be salt and light as Jesus commanded, or should we be trying to live in peace, "If it is possible, as far as it depends upon you"? (Romans 12:18)  The question is an important one because our mission of bringing the light of the Gospel to a world living in darkness is far too crucial to be squandered or impaired by our own mistakes.  The example of Daniel is useful for us because he was part of a distinct minority in the culture of Babylon.  Daniel didn't choose to live in Babylon, but he did choose to make the best of his life in Babylon.  Daniel worked hard and was straightforward in his honesty and integrity even though he was working for the government that had destroyed Jerusalem (the Babylonians, who were in turn conquered by the Medes-Persians during Daniel's tenure in Babylon).  He was a man who recognized his dependence upon the grace of God, but at the same time did not go out of his way to cause conflict that would have required God's intervention.  When Darius was tricked into issuing a decree that was in clear violation of Daniel's ability to worship and obey the God of Abraham, Daniel did the only thing he believed he could as a man whose first allegiance was to God.  He did exactly the same thing he had done the day before.  Notice, Daniel didn't go out on the street corner to protest this unjust law, even though it clearly was unjust, nor did Daniel hide his disobedience behind closed doors.  It was not rebellion against authority that Daniel craved, but obedience to God.  Until the moment of this decree, Daniel had lived in peace with his neighbors and the government of Babylon.  The consequences of choosing to disobey the king were well known to Daniel, but his trust was in God as the judge of both the living and the dead.
Do we, as Christians in America, a nation where we have the right to vote and protest, follow the example of Daniel?  Should we?  To seek out conflict with our culture or our government simply to prove ourselves as passionate Christians would be a self-serving motive more in tune with our own pride than with our witness.  At the same time, to shrink back before potential hardship would be to abandon the faith that saved you for the sake of convenience.  In reality, nobody in America is being threatened with death if they follow Jesus Christ.  Nobody in America is being told they cannot proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ in person, by print media, audio or visual media, or anything else.  It is not laws that stop Christians in America from being true to their faith, but apathy, cowardice, or simply too much wealth and comfort.  It is not the outside world that we must be in conflict with in order to bear witness to our Savior, but rather our own sin natures that we must continue to battle.  What was the real reason why Daniel disobeyed the law against praying to God?  He was already in the habit of praying long before it was illegal.

Sermon Video: The Genealogy of Jesus, Part 2 - Matthew 1:6-17

In this 2nd message on Matthew's genealogy of Jesus, there are two more women, an obvious reference to sexual scandal, and the destruction of the kingdom of Judah.  The list begins with "King David", the only person on the list given the title of king, even though the rest of his descendants until the exile were kings.  David received powerful promises from God that his descendant would one day sit upon a throne that would last forever.  Immediately following this triumphant mention of David as King comes the lowest point in the entire genealogy: the adultery and murder associated with "Uriah's wife".  Matthew didn't have to mention Solomon's mother at all, but when he did he called her "Uriah's wife" instead of Bathsheba.  This usage only shines the spotlight even more upon the deadly road of sin that David walked down from his lust to have Bathsheba, to his adultery with her, to his attempted cover-up, and eventually to his willingness to conspire to kill one of his most loyal and faithful soldiers, Uriah.
The rest of the kings in the list until the exile are a mixture of the good and the bad.  Some followed after God, others led the people astray toward wickedness and idolatry.  Overall, the trend of decline continued for the kingdom as God's people drifted further and further away from their Covenant promises.  Just before the exile in the list is the name Josiah.  Josiah became king of Judah at eight years of age when his father was assassinated; both is father and his grand-father were exceedingly wicked, what hope is there that this boy-king could save a nation headed for destruction?  Josiah's efforts at restoration had no chance of success until his high priest found a copy of the Law.  The actual words of Moses, the Covenant between God and the people of Israel had been lost!  Despite Josiah's efforts, the wrath of God at the broken promises of his people could not be assuaged.
The throne of David came to an end in 586 BC with the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.  All of the names from the exile until Joseph are unknown to history, but we do know that David's throne is vacant, no fulfillment of God's promise seems possible.  And then, at the end of the list, we have something odd.  Matthew calls Joseph the "husband" of Mary instead of the father of Jesus as he had every other name in the list.  He also tells us that it is Mary "of whom" Jesus is born (the Greek makes it clear, the pronoun is singular and feminine and cannot apply to Joseph or to both Joseph and Mary).
It is at this point, with this list of ancestors, some great and some exceedingly wicked, with gentile blood in his veins (especially through the women Matthew highlighted), that Jesus is born of Mary.  Josiah was unable to save his people from their sins as he sat on the throne of David, how can a child born in far humbler circumstances hope to do better, he will have to be no ordinary child, he will have to be the Christ.

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Sermon Video, The Genealogy of Jesus Part1 - Matthew 1:1-5

I know what you're thinking, there can't be anything worth learning about a list of names.  The Genealogy of Jesus is just a list of names isn't it?  For Matthew, the inclusion of a genealogy at the start of his biography isn't unusual for the world he lived in, but a simple list of names this isn't.  Matthew tells a story through his list of names by including five women in the list.  It was unusual in such list to include any mothers, let alone five, but what strikes us as we look at the list is which mothers Matthew chose to highlight.  It wasn't the most respectable of the ancestors of the Messiah, but rather a trio (in the first half of this 2 part message) of women with foreign roots, two of whom had a checkered past.
The first woman listed in Matthew's account is Tamar.  Tamar isn't very familiar to us because her story is left out of every Sunday School material packet on Genesis.  Tamar was married to a dishonorable man, taken advantage of sexually by a greedy brother-in-law, and backed into a corner where she resorted to prostitution at the hands of a lustful father-in-law.  The twins boys who resulted from this union were included in the line of David, and hence the Messiah, rather than any of the other sons of Judah.
The second woman in the list is the prostitute and Canaanite, Rahab.  Now, Rahab is included in our telling of the story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho, although her profession prior to the arrival of the spies is often left out.  How did this woman, renowned for her faith in a God she didn't know about (see Hebrews chapter 11) end up marrying into the line of Judah after the Israelites entered into the Promised Land?
The last woman in the list is actually one that we have no problems with but that would have been considered suspect in her day because of being a Moabite.  Ruth is remembered for her loyalty and faith, and for finding a good and faithful man in Boaz, but she would have been an unlikely grandmother for Israel's greatest king had not God provided for her in response to her faith.
In the end, Matthew didn't have to include any of these women, but he chose to, that means something.  Is he trying to tell us that the Messiah came from an imperfect line as we all did, but was perfect himself?  Is he trying to tell us to judge these women with fresh eyes and see their true value by including these three in particular?  Regardless of what conclusion we come to about Matthew purpose, it seems clear that this isn't just a list of names.

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Pope Francis' views on capitalism and Rush Limbaugh

I turned 18 on the day of the 1992 Presidential election between George Bush and Bill Clinton.  It was my first opportunity to vote, and my first experience with being disappointed by an election.  I grew up in a solidly Republican rural county, was a member of a Bible preaching church that was also clearly Republican in its attitude.  I remember speaking out against the Pope (John Paul II at the time) without knowing much about him because it was a given within evangelical circles that when the Anti-Christ came he would be the Pope (as reflected in the Left Behind series).  I listened to Rush Limbaugh on my commute home from work and agreed with much of what he had to say.
Over the years my eyes were opened to ecumenical issues, I became aware of the work of God within churches of other denominations, including the Roman Catholic Church.  My opinion of Pope John Paul II, now informed, was raised greatly by his brave stance against Soviet Communism.  At the same time, I began to listen to Rush Limbaugh less with each passing year; much of the reason was simply that I was tired of hearing the same old complaints and no longer accepted that Democrats were inherently evil and Republicans more/less good.  My understanding of human nature informed my understanding of politics because I could see that Lord Acton was right when he spoke about the tendency of absolute power to corrupt absolutely.  The solution to America's problems was never going to begin in Washington, on that level I still agreed with Rush, but we diverged when he saw an economic solution through the American businessman and I saw a spiritual solution through the Church.  Eventually, I stopped listening to Rush Limbaugh because I still have hope for America's future and the constant government is evil pronouncements he continues to offer isn't helpful to me as I work on a daily basis with the poor alongside government officials who I know truly want to help them.
Is Pope Francis a Marxist?  Hardly, Pope Francis decided not to join the Liberation Theology movement in Argentina, nor did he side with the government as they tried to suppress communist movements.  What the future Pope did instead was to continue to minister to the people that God had called him to serve.  Rugged Individualism may sound like a great idea, but it isn't a Biblical one.  Yes, each person should work if able, but washing your hands of those who are struggling, or have failed, to succeed in a given economic system is an unacceptable anti-Christian attitude.  We may disagree on how to truly help the poor, but we cannot afford to write-off the poor lest we destroy the integrity our very message of love in Christ.
Who will I listen to about justice for the world's poor?  The man who spent his life living with, and helping the poor as a representative of God's Church, or a man who sits behind a radio microphone and calls that man a Marxist?  The choice really isn't that hard, I'm done with Rush Limbaugh.
I know that this line of thought may cause some of the people who knew me growing up to shake their heads and wonder what took me down a road away from their idea of what a Conservative Evangelical Christian should be; they may even stop reading my blog out of some sort of allegiance to Rush.  If they do, that's their choice, I'm living my life in service to the call of Christ to help the widows and orphans, to hold out hope to the hopeless, to love them in the name of Christ.  Politics isn't the solution, it never was.  Pope Francis may not have all the answers, but at least he's on the right track, and I have no reason to doubt his willingness to carry his cross for the sake of the Gospel; I'll keep listening to him.