Luke 2:6,7 * December 25, 2009 * Christmas Day * Pastor Pagels
In the name of the One whose birth we celebrate today, the One whom shepherds guard and angels sing, the Christ of Christmas, dear friends:
Happy Birthday! If you are familiar with some of the secular traditions surrounding Christmas you might remember that those were the first two words that came out of Frosty the Snowman’s mouth when the children put the magic hat on his head and brought him to life. We won’t be honoring Frosty today, but we can still appreciate what he said.
We are here this morning to celebrate a birthday, and many of things we associate with a birthday party will be a part of today’s festivities. There are decorations and candles. There will be singing and eating. And a birthday wouldn’t be a birthday without gifts. What makes our celebration different from the average birthday party is that the guest of honor is not the one receiving all the gifts. He is the one giving them. In fact, he himself is the gift.
On this day we give thanks for the many gifts we have been given. On this day we remember the greatest gift that has ever been given. On this festival day we rejoice because this day is God’s gift to you and me…
CHRISTMAS IS THE GIFT OF GOD
There are many different names for Jesus in the Bible, and that means this holiday could go by a variety of different names. We could call it “Jesus-mas” or “Lord-mas” or “Alpha and Omega-mas,” but we don’t. Christians call this day Christmas Day for a reason.
The first half of “Christmas” is “Christ,” a Greek term that means “the Anointed One.” The Hebrew equivalent is a name that you are likely to recognize as well, “Messiah.” Right after Adam and Eve disobeyed God and destroyed God’s perfect creation, God promised to send them a Savior, a Messiah, a seed of the woman to crush the serpent’s head and save the world from sin.
For thousands of years God’s people waited for the Messiah
to come, and along the way the Lord spoke through people called prophets to
remind them of his promise. Jacob
prophesied that the Christ would come from the tribe of Judah (Genesis 49:10),
and Isaiah narrowed it down to the clan of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1). Micah pinpointed where he would be born
(Micah 5:2; in
Prophecy after prophecy prepared God’s people for the coming of the Messiah, but then all of the sudden they stopped. Four hundred years of silence. No prophets. No Messianic messages. No more information. No additional details. It was as if God had forsaken his people. It was as if God had forgotten his promise.
But the Lord had not forgotten his people or his promise. After four centuries God broke his silence. When the time had fully come God sent an angel to Zechariah. And then he sent the same angel to Mary with amazing news: “The Savior is coming. The One for whom you have been hoping and praying is almost here. And Mary, because nothing is impossible with God, this child, the Christ-child, will be your child.”
On Christmas Day Christians celebrate the birth of Christ (and we will talk about those events more in just a moment), but today we also marvel at the wonder of God’s Word before the Word became flesh. Thousand of years. Hundreds of prophecies. All of them fulfilled. Every one of them perfectly fulfilled in Jesus.
How could these ancient writers know so many details so many
years before the Savior’s birth? There
is only one explanation. It was a
miracle. The church father Justin Martyr
put it this way: “To describe a thing
that should come to pass long before it is in being, and to bring it to pass,
this or nothing is the work of God.”
Inspiring the writers of the Old Testament so that they could see into the distant future, instructing the angel to explain everything that was about to take place, all of it was the work of God. Every one of these Messianic prophecies was a miracle, a miracle that anticipated an even greater miracle.
Today I want you to witness this miracle through the eyes of
a shepherd. The night is calm. The sheep are calm. All is calm, and all becomes bright when the
sky lights up with legions of angels.
Holy angels. Singing angels
singing about glory in heaven and peace on earth. One of them announces that the Savior has
been born. He’s not far. In a barn.
In
Almost immediately you and the other shepherds decide to leave your flocks and look for this place. Soon you find it just as the angel said. You see a mother and a father huddled around a manger. It’s not a classic family picture, but then again nothing on this night can be considered ordinary.
As you slowly and reverently draw near, you look into the feeding trough and see the baby. Before you can ask Mary proudly tells you that his name is Jesus (which means Savior). At that moment you don’t fully comprehend the prophetic nature of that name. You don’t understand how this little child can be the Christ, but you don’t need to be convinced that this baby is special. You realize that you can’t keep news this good to yourself. And so you share it. You tell everyone you see what the angel told you.
Today Christians travel from the farthest corners of the
globe to
“God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). There is only one explanation for this kind of unconditional love. There can be only one answer to the question: “Why did God give up his most precious possession, why did he give us his one and only Son, why was Jesus born into this sinful world to save sinful people like us?” It’s a miracle. It’s a Christmas miracle.
The baby in the manger looks like us because he is one of us. He is, as the creeds confess, true man. All he does now is eat and sleep, but soon he will grow in wisdom and stature. He will walk and talk and hunger and thirst. He will laugh and cry and suffer and die...because he is fully human.
But this child is also true God, and he will prove it. He will amaze the teachers in the temple with his wisdom. He will still storms and drive out demons. He will make the blind see and the mute speak. Again and again this man will reveal that he is no ordinary man, and every time he does it will be an Epiphany miracle.
But he will not always make use of his divine power. Some will oppose him. Some will make plans to arrest him. And he will let them. The almighty Son of God will allow himself to be condemned and crucified. His enemies will taunt him. They will dare him to save himself. They will dare him to come down from the cross. Which he could do. Which he could do in an instant. But he won't. He will stay on the cross. He will die on the cross. For us. To redeem us. A Lenten miracle.
And when his followers come to pay their final respects, the stone that sealed his grave shut won't be there. Neither will Jesus' body, and an angel will explain why: "He is not here; he has risen, just as he said" (Matthew 28:6).
Jesus will rise from the dead to declare that he has power over death. The risen Lord will appear to his followers to prove that he is victorious and that we have nothing to fear. Dead people don't come back to life, but Jesus did. Jesus rose. Jesus lives. It’s an Easter miracle.
You could say that Jesus' life on earth consisted of a series of miracles. He was conceived of the Spirit and born of a virgin. He was true God and true man in one person. He was born a pure and holy baby, and for thirty three years he lived a pure and holy life. He healed the sick and raised the dead, and he even raised himself from the dead.
The One who has power over death has raised us from the dead too. We were dead in our transgressions and sins. We can't make up for them. We can't make excuses for them. There is nothing in our power, nothing we can say or do to save ourselves from the eternal death we deserve.
But what we couldn't do God has done for us. He has given us his Son. He has forgiven our sins. He fills our hearts with peace and hope and joy. When I think about the amazing grace God has shown to us, when I consider the amazing things God has done for us, I can only think of one word to describe it all. It's a miracle.
When children receive gifts they sometimes need to be reminded to say thank you. This morning the children of God need no such reminder. We thank our heavenly Father for the gifts he gives us each day. We thank him for the gift in the manger that is ours today. We give thanks for the gift of God that is Christmas Day. “For unto (us) is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11, KJV). Amen.