Badenoch Free Church

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Morning Service sunday 23rd Dec 2007
 
Mat 1v21-23
Intro:
The bible is one big story of how much God loves people.
1st of all He created people.
2nd He had fellowship with people. He walked with Adam in the garden.
3rd He sought out ways to save people. From Genesis 3 onwards the story of the bible is all about God saving people.
Christmas is all about God’s continuing plan of salvation at its most pivotal point
The incarnation!
What do we remember this Christmas? Jesus.
Why did He come? Jesus came to Save, to Fulfil & to Encourage.
Jesus Saves v21, Fulfils v22, Encourages v23.
 
1)Jesus came to save: (Jesus: name tells us what he will do)
21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, {Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua, which means the LORD saves.} because he will save his people from their sins."
A) Jesus came into the world by way of a supernatural birth.
The bible is full of stories of amazing births.
Gen 21 - Abraham 100 and Sarah 90, give birth to Isaac.
Isaac and Rebecca give birth to Jacob and Esau - twins, older serves the younger.
Jacob marries Rachel and after a long time of barrenness give birth to Joseph.
Moses is born at a very difficult time and survives the kings command to kill all the new born boys.
Judges 13 - Samson was another miraculous birth, for his mother was “sterile and had no children”
1sam1 - Hannah give birth to Samuel after years of nothing. A birth in answer to prayer.
Into the NT right at the start we have the story of another amazing birth.
John the Baptist. Elizabeth and Zechariah both too old for having children. But ….
Luke 1:18 18 Zechariah asked the angel, "How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well on in years."
B) The last amazing birth is of course the birth of Jesus.
He was to be called Jesus meaning Yahweh Saves! All the other births point to the salvation that God was planning but now we have the real deal in the birth of Jesus.
The Greek is very emphatic at this point. It is Jesus who saves us.
“he himself will save”
Nobody else, no other way, only Jesus.
And he will do it. Right at the start there is no doubt. “He WILL save”
He is the Jesus, he is the Saviour.
 
2) Fulfil “22 All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet:”
Jesus came to fulfil prophecy
This may seem like a minor point but it is not.
Fulfilling of prophecy was proof of authenticity. Without the fulfilment then the deduction was that there was lies spoken and false prophecy.
Jesus came to prove that the word God had spoken was true!
And one of the main points of Matthews gospel is to show that Jesus has fulfilled these messianic prophecies. It was specifically written for Jewish readers who new their OT prophecies!
“someone has counted 333 prophecies in the OT about the Person, Coming and Ministry of the Messiah………it has been calculated that the chances of these prophecies being fulfilled in one person are one in eighty three billion.”
For us this tells us one great thing: we can trust the word of God!
God is proved right, his word is true.
We can live our lives by the word of God because it is true!
Note is says “all this took place” - the whole orchestration of the event was under Gods control.
There was of course the human freedom and choice involved but God was governing over it all.
Shows his greatness. We can trust him. He is reliable, like no other.
3) Jesus came to encourage us: (Immanuel tells us who he is.)
The particular prophecy that Jesus came to fulfil in this context is:
23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"-- {Isaiah 7:14} which means, "God with us."
It is of course a quote from Isaiah 7.
The context of that chapter is that Israel is at a low ebb.
Two nations are plotting to destroy Jerusalem and the people are full of fear.
But the LORD comes to them and says to them that the plot will fail and that they are to keep the faith.
And the sign given that Gods word will take place is the prophecy that is before us.
The prophecy was given as an encouragement for the people to keep the faith.
Is not this what we need to do today also? Keep the faith.
Why should we? Because God is with us.
Jesus came to be “with us”. Immanuel - “God with us”
Above everything else this is meant to be an encouragement for us!
To have someone with us to hold our hand. To comfort. ………
“God with us” God is for you, wants to look after you, bless you, save you …..
God does not want to judge, condemn, cast into hell …………..
“God with us”………
Who is Jesus? He is God. Why did he come? To be with us!
 
 
 
evening service 23rd dec 2007
 
 
Matthew 2:10-12 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.
 
This morning we noted that Christmas was all about Jesus.
Tonight we ask: what are we to do with Him?
The answer is simple. We are to worship him. Our lives are meant to be acts of worship. What does that entail?
Joy : seeing : giving : care.
V10: “they were overjoyed” - joy.
V11: “they saw the child…and worshipped” - seeing.
V11: “presented him with gifts” - giving.
V12: “having been warned” - care.
 
 
1) 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.
The wise men were seeking Jesus and as they began to approach him they were overjoyed.
“overjoyed” : rejoiced exceedingly with great joy!
They had found the treasure: their search was about to yield its reward.
Our worship has to have this overwhelming joy. We have found the answer to life, we have found Jesus.
A life that is dull and boring, full of doom and gloom is not a life of worship.
We don’t get more spiritual, the more serious and dull we are! We get less spiritual.
Every day we are to rejoice in Jesus and salvation.
So serious is the need for joy that without it, we will not be able to live a life of worship!
Joy is the fuel that drives our lives of worship.
What gives us joy? Love. We love Jesus, He loves us.
2) V11: “they saw the child…and worshipped” - seeing.
Our worship needs this element of seeing.
It was easy for the WM. The saw Jesus with the physical eye and they worshipped.
One day this ease of worship will be afforded to all of us.
Revelation 1:7 7 Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him. So shall it be! Amen.
But for now, how do we see Jesus? We need to live by faith, every day.
When we get up we need to say “the Lord is in this place and I know it”. That is to be our motto.
We will only see if we are looking for him. Recognise his presence is everywhere.
Small children are amazing. Birth is a miracle. In these things we need to see Jesus and God at work.
If we are to properly have lives of worship we need to see Him.
Do all you can then to help you look and see.
 
 
3)V11: “presented him with gifts” - giving.
Another essential aspect for worship is giving. The custom of the day was to present the King with valuable gifts.
Our offerings reflect the giving of the WM and are good essential parts of our worship.
Yet financial giving can be used as an excuse for not living a life of worship.
At the end of the day, when we get to heaven what will we have to give to God?
Only ourselves. Thus we need to make sure that we are worth giving.
How? By practising now.
Everyday get up and offer you life to Jesus.
Fulfil your responsibilities and commitments, as Jesus would if he were you.
Do your work, as Jesus would if he were you.
Raise your family, as Jesus would if he were you.
Live your life, will all your gifts and talents, as Jesus would if he were you!
Then something truly amazing will happen:
Jesus will start to use your life for amazing and great things.
The gifts the WM brought would have been used to help save his family as they fled to Egypt.
How amazing to think that Jesus will use you, as you give yourself to him.
 
 
4) V12: “having been warned” - care.
Finally, our worship of Jesus will do all in its power to do, to take care of Jesus.
The WM wanted the best for Jesus. They wanted no harm to come to him. So they went out of their way in getting home to take care of Jesus.
If we love him, rejoice over him, look for him in all things, offer ourselves to him, then we will do all that we can to care for him!
This points to one of the great practical areas of our worship. In that taking care of Jesus means that we take care of one another.
Jesus does not need taking care of. He is in glory with all authority in heaven and on earth. In some ways too his people do not need taking care of.
We are safe and secure in him.
And so one of the ways we take care of each other is by encouraging one another with these great fact.
But then on top of that we care for each other in practical ways. We care for each other by …………………….
This Christmas let us worship the LORD.