SPEAKER_00: So about 2,000 years ago, Caesar Augustus decided he was going to have a census.
SPEAKER_00: And so this was probably about money, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he wanted a census, see how many people so we can raise the revenues.
SPEAKER_00: And so he declared everybody to return to their hometown.
SPEAKER_00: The story's starting to sound familiar.
SPEAKER_00: And so Joseph up in Nazareth, he has to go down to Bethlehem.
SPEAKER_00: It's about 70 miles.
SPEAKER_00: It's probably somewhere between, say, four to seven days of a journey.
SPEAKER_00: And so he's engaged to this girl named Mary, and she's pregnant, and they're not married, so you've got to see that this is somewhat of a scandal.
SPEAKER_00: And so maybe this is a love-hate trip in terms of they get out of town, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because I'm assuming there's some people in this religious setting that aren't looking too favorably upon their engagement situation with her pregnant, and they're not understanding Luke 1, that actually she became pregnant with the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe for you, that's where, even, like I said before, that's where you tune out.
SPEAKER_00: You're like stockings, presents, carols.
SPEAKER_00: I'm good, I'm good, I'm good.
SPEAKER_00: Luke 1, uh a girl pregnant with the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm I don't know about that.
SPEAKER_00: So they head south, probably four to seven-day journey, and they make it down there and and uh they they get into town, into Bethlehem, and they're looking around, right?
SPEAKER_00: Uh and and in after inn.
SPEAKER_00: Uh we don't know if this means does it mean you know, Hampton in a guest house.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, so basically places to stay.
SPEAKER_00: They're not available.
SPEAKER_00: They can't, and they're needing their own little miracle, right?
SPEAKER_00: We're all looking for a miracle.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you're here at even that Luke 1 miracle about the girl getting pregnant, and that's like, I'm not, I don't believe that miracle.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you hear you say I don't even believe in miracles.
SPEAKER_00: And I would say, well, entertain me.
SPEAKER_00: Like just entertain me a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Because I think you do believe in miracles.
SPEAKER_00: Because I think we're all believing in a miracle, we're all needing a miracle, and whether you believe this miracle is gonna come outside of yourself, this redemptive miracle, that you're gonna, you're gonna, outside of yourself, you're gonna create some redemption out of your shame and your guilt and your inadequacy, um, all of the things that you know about yourself and you wonder if other people knew about them, could they really love me?
SPEAKER_00: Your inability to love others more than yourself, your pride, your judgment towards others, and maybe you're secular and it's just hedonism, or maybe you're religious and it's prideful.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe it's just never enough.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing's ever enough.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's like greed and it's envy and it's lust.
SPEAKER_00: And we all need a miracle out of this.
SPEAKER_00: And so I don't know if you're believing in a miracle like Luke 1, or if you're believing in a miracle like that's gonna come out of yourself.
SPEAKER_00: But you need a miracle.
SPEAKER_00: And you're believing in a miracle.
SPEAKER_00: And the incarnation is the miracle of Christianity.
SPEAKER_00: Him showing up, God showing up face to face with humanity after centuries of prophets and laws.
SPEAKER_00: So Joseph and Mary, they cruise into town, there's no room in the inn, right?
SPEAKER_00: There's no Hampton Inn, there's no VRBO, they haven't sent ahead for the reservation, and they're looking for a place, and finally they find a stable.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we assume a cave, something where animals are kept.
SPEAKER_00: Real, really high-class place here.
SPEAKER_00: And we know the story because the nativity scene is on your dining room table.
SPEAKER_00: The one your grandmother gave you.
SPEAKER_00: You don't like it, you keep putting it out because she's gonna show up for dinner tonight.
SPEAKER_00: She's next to you right now.
SPEAKER_00: You feel a little awkward that I even mentioned it.
SPEAKER_00: She's gonna notice actually that you moved it to the hallway table.
SPEAKER_00: Because it was on the dining room table last year, and now it's in the hallway table, and she's gonna notice that.
SPEAKER_00: She's not gonna mention it, but she's gonna notice it.
SPEAKER_00: Just don't move it to the workbench in the garage.
SPEAKER_00: That's where the family's gonna have a huge tift.
SPEAKER_00: So Mary has this baby boy, and she wraps this boy up in swadding clothes, and she places him in a manger, a feeding trough, right?
SPEAKER_00: I had a feeding trough for animals, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then the story shifts, and we see part of the story out.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and I and I've I've stood there.
SPEAKER_00: I got I got to go to Israel maybe about five or six years ago, and I was standing in Bethlehem, and I was looking out over these fields, and it's these rolling hills where these shepherds would have had their sheep.
SPEAKER_00: And so there's shepherds out there, and they're watching over their flocks by.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Good job.
SPEAKER_00: Great, fantastic.
SPEAKER_00: And these guys, these are the lowest of the low shepherds.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we can't, we kind of we I mean, the shepherd thing, because the New Testament talks about shepherds all the time, by the end of the New Testament, you're like, oh, shepherds are great, Jesus was a shepherd.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is the lowest of low.
SPEAKER_00: These are dirty guys, these are guys with horrible reputations.
SPEAKER_00: They're never allowed in the temple.
SPEAKER_00: They're outcasts.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Like I know some of you, you would have fit in really great with these people.
SPEAKER_00: Like we would have all, actually, we would have all fit in really great with these people.
SPEAKER_00: We just shower and dress nicer than these people.
SPEAKER_00: But we're just like them.
SPEAKER_00: Lowest of the low.
SPEAKER_00: And so they're out there and they're watching over their sheep, and it is dead quiet, dead silent.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Like vacant of any noise, and they're sleeping, but their ears are so attuned to any noise because if they lose a sheep, they they lose income, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so you can imagine this.
SPEAKER_00: You're asleep, but you lose a sheep to some you know, thief, and you're losing income.
SPEAKER_00: So you are asleep, but your ears are attuned to that twig that's broken like 400 yards down valley.
SPEAKER_00: And verse 9 of Luke 2 says, like, you know, like that, an angel appears in the volume.
SPEAKER_00: The volume and the light goes from zero to a hundred.
SPEAKER_00: And so, of course, they're afraid.
SPEAKER_00: And it says in verse 9, the glory of the Lord shone all around them.
SPEAKER_00: And so, yeah, they're afraid, you know why?
SPEAKER_00: Because the glory of God exposes us.
SPEAKER_00: All of our mass and pretending and performing and achieving, all the ways we escape.
SPEAKER_00: Our messy, fragile, sinful hearts are exposed.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe here you say, not me.
SPEAKER_00: See, I'm not fragile, I'm not messy, I have my act together, I'm not sinful, I make my own way, I'm a good person, I'm a moral person.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, you'd say, You should see my record.
SPEAKER_00: I have this self-righteousness record, and I keep a tab, I got it in my pocket, I could pull it out, I could tell you all about it.
SPEAKER_00: And I was just reminded this week.
SPEAKER_00: I was reminded this week, I was listening to a sermon, and it was a kind of a QA thing, and somebody asked the question, and that was the question.
SPEAKER_00: The guy was saying, hey, you know, I think I'm a pretty good person, and the response was, keep looking.
SPEAKER_00: Like, just keep looking.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, because if you're saying that, you're like a blind man on the edge of the Grand Canyon saying you don't see a hole.
SPEAKER_00: So let's jump into this passage, Luke 2, verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: We're starting starting verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: The angels are there, that volume has gone to full throttle, they're afraid, and the angel says, Do not be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So, in the same moment you're exposed and you're afraid, the glory of God relieves you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people.
SPEAKER_00: Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you.
SPEAKER_00: He is the Messiah, the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: This will be assigned to you.
SPEAKER_00: You will be you will find a baby wrapped in clothes, lying in a manger.
SPEAKER_00: Suddenly, a great company of heavenly hosts appeared with the angel praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth, peace to those on whom his favor rests.
SPEAKER_00: I read this last Monday, and I just thought, like, so peace comes by being in God's favor?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm just going, I don't, I don't know if I'm in that club.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I mean, do you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't know if I'm a candidate for that.
SPEAKER_00: I get impatient with my wife, I get impatient with my children.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I get I get angry, I get needy, and then I get religious, so I'm a pastor, so I get proud.
SPEAKER_00: And then I think I'm kind of smart, so then I kind of have judgment over you.
SPEAKER_00: And then I sit in self-pity because of all that, which is another form of pride, and you just go, how could I be favored with all of this going on inside of me?
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you look at your life and you know this feeling.
SPEAKER_00: You know these feelings.
SPEAKER_00: How could I be favored and this peace of God come to me because of your pastor, because of an addiction, because of a family situation, or that thing, that shame, and that feeling of inadequacy that doesn't go away because your situation of some sort.
SPEAKER_00: Ah.
SPEAKER_00: But he came to the shepherds.
SPEAKER_00: He came to the shepherds.
SPEAKER_00: Lowest of the low.
SPEAKER_00: That lowly, disreputable bunch.
SPEAKER_00: See, God comes for those who realize they can never come to him.
SPEAKER_00: That's the way in.
SPEAKER_00: So here's the point.
SPEAKER_00: The point is God favors you.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't just love you, he likes you.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not based on your work for him.
SPEAKER_00: It is based on his work on your behalf.
SPEAKER_00: So let me say it another way.
SPEAKER_00: Your favor before God is not based on your love for him, but based on his love for you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the incarnation, the incarnate love of God for us to know so we can know what he is like and what he thinks.
SPEAKER_00: And what we see in Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, our church spent about a year, over a year in the book of John, just looking at how does Jesus interact with people?
SPEAKER_00: Man, he just loves people.
SPEAKER_00: He loves a whole bunch of disreputable, lowly folks.
SPEAKER_00: So yesterday morning I was looking through Luke 1 and Luke 2, I was at the Starbucks up by my in-laws, and so I'm sitting at the table and I got my laptop open, I got my earbuds in, and I'm working, and the music going, and what I see play out is I see a lady, and she's not much far beyond my table.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, she's just at the table beyond, and so she's just like five feet away.
SPEAKER_00: And she's there waiting, and a guy walks in and he walks in, and they're both dressed casually, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so he walks up and they she stands and they shake hands.
SPEAKER_00: It's good, good to meet you.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm going, all right, so it's like December 23rd, they're both dressed casually, but they shake hands.
SPEAKER_00: That was the curveball, right?
SPEAKER_00: So this is, you know, it's a shake, but they're dressed casually, so it's probably not business, but they're so casually dressed.
SPEAKER_00: And so so I'm just I'm nosed, I'm nosy and I'm curious.
SPEAKER_00: What is this playing out in front of me?
SPEAKER_00: And so I don't take my earbuds out because I don't want them to know that I'm gonna listen in on all this.
SPEAKER_00: So I just I mute my music.
SPEAKER_00: And fortunately, they were right above my screen, so I didn't even have to like you know be looking over.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was I was dead-eyed looking into their situation.
SPEAKER_00: And so he starts talking, and he starts saying, Well, I I I was I'm from North Dakota, and then I moved to Texas, and then I was in Ohio a little bit, and now I'm in Georgia, and then she talks, and and she says, you know, I like to ski, and he says, Well, I like to water ski, and they're talking, and he's fidgeting, his feet are like in and out of the legs of the chair.
SPEAKER_00: He can't quite figure out how to sit.
SPEAKER_00: You know, he's like this, and he's like this, and he's like this, and it's like, am I engaged or like cool?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's like back and forth, and and she's uh, you know, just kind of about every two minutes.
SPEAKER_00: And so finally I hear one of them say, Yeah, so I saw on your profile that, and then the other one says, Yeah, yeah, so when you messaged me and said, So, okay, so I'm putting it together, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like this is the this is the this is the first date of a whole bunch of online interaction.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm in the date.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean I'm I'm with them.
SPEAKER_00: I'm online dating.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm learning about them and all this.
SPEAKER_00: But this meeting had to happen, right?
SPEAKER_00: See, she's there, he has to show up.
SPEAKER_00: Incarnation has to happen if there's ever a shot at real knowledge and real relationship.
SPEAKER_00: See, God had to walk into the Starbucks and extend his hand to us for any shot of relationship to really happen.
SPEAKER_00: And he does it, not as a Starbucks, he does it in a stable and in a manger, surrounded by animals and surrounded by shepherds.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the most humble of ways.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's why.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, here is why.
SPEAKER_00: Because he didn't come with a sword to slay you because of all your inability to live up to all of his standards.
SPEAKER_00: He came to extend his arms to you.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see it?
SPEAKER_00: This is what the incarnation is about.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see it?
SPEAKER_00: Because what it's about, it is about he bent toward us as we are always bending away from him.
SPEAKER_00: It is the only way for a sinful heart to be relieved and forgiven and freed and to be brought back to God.
SPEAKER_00: Paul expounds on this in Ephesians.
SPEAKER_00: I close with this.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians 1, 7, and 8.
SPEAKER_00: In him, in Jesus, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us.
SPEAKER_00: So that word lavished, it just means it's just too much.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Like this is what we're all a lot of us are going to experience tomorrow morning.
SPEAKER_00: This is gonna be some lavish amounts of gifts.
SPEAKER_00: It's just too much.
SPEAKER_00: It's extravagant, it's out of control, it's over the limit, it's grace upon grace upon grace, it's never ending, it's forever.
SPEAKER_00: See, you and I were shepherds.
SPEAKER_00: We're the lowly bunch out in the fields.
SPEAKER_00: We're the lady at the Starbucks waiting, just hoping someone will show up to love us.
SPEAKER_00: Will someone show up to love us?
SPEAKER_00: And the answer is yes.
SPEAKER_00: The incarnation occurred.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Christmas is about.
SPEAKER_00: We need the riches of God's grace to pull us out of our perpetual poverty.
SPEAKER_00: And this is how he gives peace to men.
SPEAKER_00: That we are favored because he came toward us to live amongst us and to die for us.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: God, we thank you that you come toward us even as we move away from you, and that in you we have the redemption of our blood.
SPEAKER_00: We confess we love to try to pull miracles out of our own pockets.
SPEAKER_00: And for so many of us, we're exhausted trying.
SPEAKER_00: It is only by you and in you that we will have redemption, only by your blood, and in your blood that we have the forgiveness and the freedom that our hearts so desperately need.
SPEAKER_00: Only by the riches of your grace toward us.
SPEAKER_00: That you lavish on us.
SPEAKER_00: Are we made whole?