Sermon Video: "the power of the Most High" - Luke 1:34-35

The basic elements of the Christmas story are well known, but what of the deeper questions of purpose and meaning?  To know that Jesus, the Christ, was born of Mary is of course important, but our understanding needs to be more than that, we need to know why Jesus came, and why he had to be who he was, and nothing less, in order to fulfill that purpose.  The conversation between the angel Gabriel and Mary that informed her of her impending pregnancy contains the answers to those two questions.  Gabriel tells Mary that her pregnancy will not be the result of any normal biological process, her betrothed Joseph will have nothing to do with it, but instead the power of God himself, the Holy Spirit, will "come upon" her and "overshadow" her.  This unique conception will eliminate the stain of original sin, Adam's curse, from the child, and also be the key to his all important dual nature, both man and God, for as Gabriel further explains, the child to be born of Mary will not only be holy, but also be the Son of God.  These details are crucial to the Christian understanding of who Jesus was, and is, and what he would later accomplish through the Cross and Resurrection.  He had to be sinless to escape the penalty of death hanging over us all, and he had to be God in the flesh in order to accept our penalty for sin upon his shoulders and share his righteousness with us.  The sorrow of Good Friday and the celebration of Easter are not possible without the Virgin Birth, the conception by the Holy Spirit, and the pre-incarnate Word of God made flesh as Jesus, the Son of God.

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Sermon Video: "The Word became flesh" - John 1:14

“The Word became flesh”, those words begin John 1:14 and themselves are filled to overflowing with meaning.  The incarnation of Jesus Christ, the eternal Word of God now joined together with human flesh and blood in a Bethlehem manger, becomes the pivot point of history as divinity is combined with humanity in God’s all-out effort to restore humanity to fellowship with him.  This dual nature of Jesus, far from being just an interested fact, is an essential element in the Gospel message itself that cannot be watered-down because the essence of the Good News is that our faith is IN Jesus Christ, the God-man.  What he accomplished while here on earth is entirely connected with who he was.

                The phrase after that first one is equally full of implications, “and made his dwelling among us.”  To Jewish readers, this harkens back to the term used to describe God’s portable dwelling with his people, the Tabernacle.  God tabernacled with his people, dwelling among them, but in a very unapproachable way, within the Holy of Holies, only accessible once per year on the Day of Atonement, and only by the High Priest.  Now, with the incarnation, God through Jesus is reaching out, letting the children sit on his lap, talking with people, having lunch with “sinners”, and even reaching out his hand to touch the untouchable lepers.  God is “with us” in a far more dramatic way, a step that paves the way for the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost to dwell within those who follow Jesus.

                The last third of the verse speaks of the glory of Jesus, an example of the unique glory of God, and the grace and truth that he brought with him.  The glory revealed within Jesus is another reminder of how far short humanity has fallen from that of our Creator, the coming of the Christ was an act of grace designed to rectify that deficit, and the truth preached by Jesus is that he himself is the way through which we can be saved.  Thus Christmas is indeed a time for celebration, a time to commemorate the coming of the Way, the Truth, and the Life to dwell among us, to be one of us, and to save us.

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Sermon Video: "In the beginning was the Word" - John 1:1-5

The story of Christmas, with all its wondrous details of angels, shepherds, magi, and a manger is a compilation from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.  The Gospel of Mark begins its narrative of the life of Jesus with the adult John the Baptist’s call to the people of Israel to repent, John’s Gospel, like Mark’s, begins its narrative with John the Baptist, but it does include a prologue that sheds some powerful light upon the Christmas story even without mentioning any of the parts of the story that children love to hear.  Luke begins his story with the coming of Gabriel to Zechariah to foretell the birth of John the Baptist, Matthew with the dream of Joseph where the angel tells him that Mary’s pregnancy is not a sinful mistake but a divine intervention.  John’s prologue backs up much further than either of these accounts of Jesus by starting, “In the beginning”.  The one who will become incarnate at Bethlehem has a history that predates all of creation and even time itself.  Before anything that now is, except for God, had come to be, the Word of God already was in existence.  That Word, which could also be translated as: thought, expression, idea, or speech, was both with God “in the beginning” and that Word was God from the beginning.  With his opening statement, John’s Gospel makes an incredible and amazing claim for Jesus: he was, and is God. 

                This same claim concerning Jesus will be made throughout John’s Gospel, most famously with the “I AM” statements, yet here in the prologue John has already removed all doubt from those who would question his intention.  If John is taken at face value, Jesus must be considered as fully God, anything less is to ignore the Gospel’s claims.  Along with existing before all else, the Word also had a necessary role in the creation of everything that exists, so much so that John assures us that nothing exists that he didn’t have a part in creating. 

                The next thing that John shares concerning the Word of God pertains to life itself.  It is clear that human life is qualitatively superior to all other life as we know it, we alone ask ourselves about where life came from, what its purpose is, and what happens to us after we die.  Such questions have been asked by our ancestors throughout history, but the light had only shined dimly through natural revelation (looking at the world around us) and those who had a connection with God but were themselves imperfect vessels.  All of that changed with the coming of the Word, who was both originator of the life of mankind, as well as a beacon of light shining in the darkness and pointing us toward the Father.  The darkness, for its part, has been entirely unable to understand/overcome the coming of the light of Christ, it cannot understand how humility, service, and self-sacrifice are God’s ultimate tools of victory because hate does not comprehend love.

                John has already made definitive claims about who Jesus, as the Word of God, was and is, as John’s prologue continues, in vs. 10-14, the purpose of his coming among us in the flesh will be made clear.

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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: The Angels and the Shepherds, Luke 2:8-20

With the culmination of God's divine plan taking place in Bethlehem, all that remains is to announce the arrival of the Messiah to the world.  For God, contrary to our own instincts, the beginning of his Son's ministry on earth will be announced to lowly shepherds out in the fields.  The "good news of great joy" that a "savior" has been born who is both "Christ" and "Lord" begins as only the mission of a suffering servant could; with humility.  As the shepherds visit in awe, Mary ponders the implications of all she has seen, who will this child be?

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Sermon Video: The Birth of Jesus - Luke 2:1-7

The culmination of the Divine plan for the redemption of humanity begins with an almost unnoticed birth of a child in the small town of Bethlehem.  The couple to whom he was born were not even important enough to secure a room to stay in, and his witnesses were not kings but shepherds, but this Messiah would soon prove himself to be an unexpected savior, a servant of all.

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Sermon Video: The Birth of John the Baptist - Luke 1:39-66

The Christmas story continues with Mary hurrying to visit her relative Elizabeth, a woman to with whom she can share the story of Gabriel's visit as even now Elizabeth is in the 6th month of her miracle pregnancy.  The unborn John "leaps" in the womb of Elizabeth, prompting her to remark on the blessing that Mary has been given as the one who will bring the Lord into the world.  Following Mary's song of praise, the son of Elizabeth is born to much fanfare as word of the birth spreads far and wide.  At this point, the words of Gabriel are fulfilled and the boy is named John, but not until Elizabeth speaks up (and is disregarded) and then Zechariah confirms it in writing.  Zechariah's speech returns to him (after 9 months of silence) and he begins to praise God, adding to the general amazement and wonder as to what John will one day become.
As the birth of Jesus approaches, all eyes are on John, the one who will a few short years from now travel into the desert to prepare the way of the Lord.

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Sermon Video - The Angel's Message, Luke 1:26-38

As the Christmas story continues, Gabriel goes to the small backwoods village of Nazareth to seek out a descendant of David, a carpenter named Joseph.  When he arrives, Gabriel speaks to Joseph's fiance, Mary, instead.  The message he has for her is unlike any other; a child is to be born, before Mary has union with her future husband.  Mary is rightly confused about how this could be possible until Gabriel explains that the child will be called the Son of God; the Holy Spirit will come upon Mary and God will "overshadow" her.  The end result: Emmanuel, God with us.  Mary's response to this shocking news is a credit to her character, "I am the Lord's servant".

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